


the menagerie

by espressohno



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Academy Era, Accidental Voyeurism, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Bad Pick-Up Lines, Bodyswap, Coming In Pants, Crying, Dancing, Dirty Talk, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Hate Sex, Humor, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Light Dom/sub, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Masturbation, Mile High Club, Mutual Pining, One Night Stands, Oral Sex, Pen Pals, Pining, Semi-Public Sex, Teen Angst, Threesome, Transporter Malfunction, Unrequited Love, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-01
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2020-11-08 21:41:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 42,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20842445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/espressohno/pseuds/espressohno
Summary: hello and welcome to trektober 2019. (now complete!)so this collection basically has everything i usually write (tender fluff and heartwarming romance with non stop banter) and more (some experimenting on my usual themes with occasionally sexy results). all mckirk with one mcspirk thrown in there to keep yall on your toes.oh, and a lot of pining. pining was like the central theme across most of these prompts. please Enjoy





	1. mckirk / masturbation with an audience / E

**Author's Note:**

> can i say aisha made me do it?? heres the [post](https://espressohnos-blog.tumblr.com/post/188059970248/trektober) with all the prompts ;)

day 1: **masturbation with an audience**

So Bones was one of those lucky bastards who got assigned to a single-bed dorm. Jim wasn’t sure exactly how he was able to swing it, if it was because of his high rank in their medical program, or because he was easily a decade older than the average first-year cadet, or if he just showed up to the housing office and glared at them for as long as it took for them to assign him a single. Either way, Jim was saddled with a second-year xenolinguistics track cadet who was hardly old enough to drink and spent all of his free time in their room, studying those xeno-languages _ out loud _ , and Bones had a single. 

And he didn’t even  _ use it _ , for fuck’s sake. The man hardly slept with all the hours he was pulling at the clinic, on top of his ridiculous course load. The fact that this single, empty room remained unused,  _ unappreciated _ for most of the week was, frankly, an outrage. Jim decided to fix this issue and proclaimed it as his unofficial study space, and also decided that Bones could get over it. 

Strangely, he didn’t seem to mind that much. The longer Jim knew him, the more he started to suspect that at least half of the man’s grouchiness was disingenuine, especially when he would walk in after a clinic shift and groan  _ don’t you have anywhere else to be _ and proceed to lay down face-first on his bed with hospital corners and promptly fall asleep without actually telling Jim to leave. 

Jim usually wasn’t the kind of guy to do things for people, because nobody really taught him how that stuff worked, but he figured it made them even when he ordered takeout to arrive by the time Bones woke up from his usual post-clinic-three-hour-nap. The look on Bones’ face was priceless, even after it became part of the routine. 

It got to the point where Bones expected him, and got to know his schedule well enough that, in the case where Jim didn’t show up to his dorm to study, he received a comm which was usually a very poorly concealed question of  _ where are you?  _ Sometimes in the form of insults, such as:  _ I figured it was about time you deserted the Fleet to join the circus instead _ or  _ I don’t know how I’m supposed to wake up in time for the 5pm seminar if my six foot tall alarm clock isn’t here but bring me the notes I guess. _ They never failed to make Jim smile and blush a little bit and maybe slouch into his chair at whatever study group or make-up class or office hours he was in while he tried to come up with an equally snarky reply. 

Bones wouldn’t be expecting him today, though, because there was no way for him to know that Jim’s 1400 History of Space Exploration course got out an hour early. But Jim was pretty sure he’d be home. He never took clinic shifts on Mondays, as a personal rule, in order to recover from the weekend. It was a safe bet. Bones being happy to see him without warning was a slightly less safe bet. 

Just to be sure he wouldn’t be  _ too _ annoyed with a surprise his day off, however, Jim showed up with takeout already in his hand this time, punched in the code to his room, and put the most innocuous-looking smile on his face, the kind of smile that toed the line between  _ don’t be mad _ and _ there’s no reason for you to be mad, I brought french toast _ . 

There was no way on earth--no way in the entire charted galaxy--for Jim to have been ready to see what he saw when the doors swished open to Bones’ quarters and he walked two steps inside and his eyes landed across the room on Bones’ bed. 

On Bones. In bed. Bones was in bed. Bones was awake, in bed, leaned back against the pillows with his hand in his pants. In his boxers, actually. He didn’t even have pants on. Or a shirt. Jim would have slapped a hand over his mouth to avoid making some sort of shocked, terrified squeal at the sight, except his entire body was immediately paralyzed, and even though his jaw had dropped through the floor, nothing came out. Not even his next breath, because holy shit. 

Holy  _ fuck _ . 

Bones was hot. Like, really fucking hot. How had he never noticed this? He saw the man nearly every day. He’d spent enough time in his dorm to have witnessed him changing clothes or sprawled out in bed or unshaven in the morning. It was like Jim’s peripheral vision had caught onto all those little aspects of how unbelievably sexy he was and stored them away without further analysis, only to release the floodgates as soon as Jim stumbled upon this. He was almost naked, but it was more than that, he was--his entire body looked warm, and flushed, and his muscles were contracting and flexing and his skin was just starting to shine with sweat as he wrapped one strong, dextrous hand around--oh holy fucking shit that was his cock. Jim was staring at his cock. He was staring at all of it, the rise and fall of his chest, the pink flush and the hard set of his face as he chased his release, his  _ hand _ around his  _ cock _ and Jim had seen more than a few of those in his lifetime, and maybe he was biased and maybe he was going through a Starfleet-induced dry spell, but Bones had a goddamn perfect cock. 

So, Jim couldn’t breathe, and he couldn’t move, and he couldn’t look away, even though that was absolutely what he was supposed to do--what normal people are supposed to do--in this situation. 

He knew he was making the wrong decision by not overriding his brain and forcing himself to leave, he already knew he was fucking up and every second he stood there was putting their very new friendship more and more at risk, and still he did nothing. 

And then when his gaze traveled back up from Bones’ hand pumping his cock to his face, Bones was looking straight-- _ straight _ at him. Ice cold panic ran up his spine, from two things. 

One, Bones had just caught him doing...whatever the hell he was doing.  _ Watching? Not announcing himself? Not leaving?  _ His sin was more one of inaction, really. 

And two, he was hard. 

Bones was supposed to yell at him, now. His eyes were supposed to go wide and he was supposed to tear his hand away from where he was touching himself and maybe cover up and maybe run towards the direction of the bathroom and also, he was supposed to yell at Jim to _ get the hell out  _ and ask  _ how long have you been standing there, you moron? _

Jim didn’t know if he was just completely dissociating out of self-preservation. Maybe in reality, Bones had yelled at him and stopped touching himself. But the sight in front of him seemed to play out in the exact opposite fashion. The rhythm of Bones’ hand on his cock didn’t seem to falter at all, even after Jim saw the recognition settle in his eyes, the realization that Jim must have gotten surprise free time and showed up to study unannounced. Then Bones’ eyelids fluttered a little bit, his mouth fell open on a heavy exhale, and he regarded him through his lashes, and said, in what had to be the sexiest tone of voice Jim had ever heard in his natural  _ life _ ,

“You can watch if you want.”

If Jim was frozen in place before Bones realized he was there, he wasn’t even inhabiting his physical body anymore. He just barely managed to nod, eyes blown completely wide, and the only sensations left in his body were the pounding of his heartbeat in his ears and the aching, desperate hardness of his own cock. And then he just stood there, motionless, and watched Bones get himself off. Watched him flush deeper the longer they held eye contact, and he wondered if he imagined the way Bones’ hand sped up on his cock after his eyes flicked down for a second to what had to be the obvious erection tenting Jim’s own uniform slacks. 

It really was only a few minutes after  _ you can watch if you want  _ until Bones neared closer and closer to orgasm, the muscles in his chest and stomach and arms flexing and his heels digging into the mattress and his head pushing back against the pillows--and then he was coming, painting his stomach with his release and Jim really thought he was going to die right then and there. 

He managed to start the gears up in his brain again while he watched Bones come down from his orgasm, chest heaving and eyes blinking back open, his clean hand coming to wipe the sweat from his forehead and push the hair out of his face. 

“I brought french toast,” he croaked, and held up the bag in the hopes that it would be more attention-worthy than his very obvious hard-on. 

Bones watched him for a second, and he almost looked amused, raising one eyebrow and opening his mouth like he was either about to laugh or make fun of him. He ended up laughing, low and breathy, and leaned over to grab a t-shirt from the floor to clean himself off. Jim’s eyes got stuck on his arms and shoulders as he moved, and he asked himself how the  _ fuck _ he’d never noticed this man’s body before. And then he propped himself back up on the mattress with one elbow, reached out towards Jim with his other hand, and gestured him forward with one finger. 

Jim had gotten laid before this. He was no novice to bedroom eyes. But jesus christ. It was like every single piece of Bones’ posture and expression was the damn  _ epitome _ of  _ come-hither _ , and then Bones opened his mouth again, to speak this time. 

“Come here,” he said. Jim suddenly found that he was capable of movement. He threw the take-away bag onto the table and left a trail of boots and uniform pieces on his way to the bed. 

“That,” Jim started, swinging one leg over to straddle Bones on the bed, “was the  _ hottest _ thing I have ever seen in my  _ life. _ ”

Bones just smiled up at him, looking very pleased with himself for his ability to render self-proclaimed-sex-god-Jim-Kirk speechless, held his hand up between their bodies, and gestured him even closer. 


	2. mckirk / mile high club / M

day 2: **mile high club**

“They definitely know what we’re doing in here.”

“Isn’t that why you wanted to do this?” Leonard asked, mouth coming close to Jim’s ear. He really didn’t have a choice whether or not to be close to Jim, considering they were in an airplane bathroom and the space was tighter than a sardine can. This had all been Jim’s idea, damn it, he had no right to start backing out now. 

It was a good distraction, though, from his very reasonable fear of death-by-air-emergency. Pressing Jim up against the tiny bathroom counter, snaking his hand around his torso and into the waistband of his pants to palm his cock while he pressed his own erection into the swell of his ass--it made death feel at least _ slightly _ less eminent. 

Jim was one of those excitable bastards who _ enjoyed _ flying, who craned his neck to catch every second of the take-off and landing through the airplane window. Every time they traveled together it made Leonard wonder if they were even such a good match for each other, when the view from the airplane window usually made _ him _feel the need to hyperventilate into a paper bag and drink a minimum of three of those tiny airplane bottles of whiskey. And now, this. 

They were on a long-haul to Berlin for some trade show Jim’s company was sending him to, which he insisted on turning into a romantic getaway--even though Leonard figured that after three years together he’d made it abundantly clear that his idea of a vacation would never in a million years include any time whatsoever devoted to barreling through the stratosphere in a metal tube. Five hours in, though, after the meal service ended and the lights were dimmed down and over half of the other passengers fell asleep, Jim’s hand landed on his pants, accidentally-on-purpose, and at the consequential stirring of Leonard’s cock he apparently came up with an idea to try and make their vacation start _ now _. 

“I wanted to do this to see if I could get you to have a good time on an airplane for once,” Jim said, breathing hard and warm enough to fog up that tiny airplane-bathroom mirror. He turned his head a little bit, just enough to glance back at Leonard over his shoulder. “Now I’m not so sure it’s worth it.”

“You’re not?” Leonard mocked, tightening his grip around Jim’s cock. Jim stifled a groan and his head fell back into the crook of Leonard’s shoulder. Leonard breathed out a laugh and kissed the side of his blond head. And then Jim’s hips jerked forward--maybe of their own accord--and smashed Leonard’s wrist against the edge of the counter. 

Leonard groaned, this time in pain, then Jim muttered out an apology and tried to go back to their former position, except now Leonard was distracted by his throbbing wrist and easily knocked off balance by the _ backward _ motion of Jim’s hips, and he landed on his ass on top of the tiny airplane toilet. 

“Awww,” Jim laughed at the sight of him collapsed against the toilet and Leonard quirked an eyebrow up at him and promptly kicked him in the calf, because this was the only revenge he had enough room for. Jim yelped in pain and leaned down to cradle his calf, which had the direct result of his now bent knee going straight into Leonard’s stomach. 

“Shit, oh my god, I’m--”

“Okay,” Leonard coughed, wishing he had room to double over, although he was sure if he moved in any direction he was going to hit another of Jim’s body parts. “We’re done with this.”

Jim, still bent over, looked over at Leonard on the airplane toilet, and gave him a little apologetic smile. 

“I’m sorry,” he offered, “I don’t know how they do this in the movies.”

“And here I was thinking you were already a card-carrying member of the mile-high club.”

Jim wiggled his eyebrows up and down before letting out a quiet bark of laughter. Leonard wanted to lean forward and kiss him, for his trouble, and also for being pretty cute and a mildly effective distraction, but the risk-to-reward of moving in any way near Jim’s bony limbs just didn’t seem worth it. Jim didn’t seem to feel the same need for caution. He found space to stand on both feet again, and leaned forward to press a kiss to Leonard’s forehead. 

“Nope. You, sir, are my first.”

“Well, it was an honor,” Leonard said, if only to see the grin that broke out across Jim’s face and crinkled the skin around his eyes. “Now get out, I need some time to recover from what you just put me through.”

“Okay old man,” Jim laughed as he negotiated his way to face the door again, and just for that comment, Leonard leaned forward to slap his ass as he stepped out of the bathroom. 

Everyone who was still awake definitely knew what was going on, then, after Jim let out a pretty embarrassing sounding squeak and nearly tripped coming out of the lavatory, but Leonard decided that A, he didn’t care and B, he was going to order them another round of tiny whiskey bottles once he made it back to their seats and hope that paying for more overpriced booze would make it up to the flight attendants for what they’d just witnessed. Shit wasn’t even remotely worth it. 

_ Mile high club my ass _, he thought.


	3. mckirk / beards and stubble / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's a very beautiful cool and misty morning over here and i think it's time for some dreamy shore leave fluff, don't you?

day 3: **beards and stubble**

_ Spock was right _ , Jim thought. Well, Spock was always right, to be fair. But this time he had a point when he mentioned the illogical nature of Jim’s refusal to take a shore leave, even as he encouraged his crew to do so. Bones actually  _ took Spock’s side _ , which is arguably more unheard of than Jim going on leave. So he caved, and went on leave, and god it felt good to get away. 

He turned over in bed lazily, in the cabin’s huge, soft bed with its mountain of pillows and thick, heavy quilts, and wondered why he spent so long thinking he didn’t need this. He spread out against the sheets, taking up all the space he wanted since Bones had gotten up a few hours ago. 

Sad to see him leave, but great to watch him go. Jim had rubbed the sleep from his eyes and squished his face against the pillow and watched the early morning light shine through the windows of their little cabin and illuminate the magnificent lines of his naked body as he walked towards the bathroom. They’d only been here for a few days, and only had a few more before they went back into space, but this was like the kind of paradise where time passed differently. No alarms, no bridge to rush to, no replicated food. Every day started with real sunshine and fresh air and coffee and Bones’ cooking and every day ended with Bones’ hands on his skin, on the rug in front of the fireplace, or against those charming wooden kitchen counters, or in the waterfall shower, or in this big, amazing bed. Jim almost pinched himself. 

Instead, he pushed himself out of bed, feeling that satisfying heaviness in his body from a long, deep sleep, and went to find coffee. Coffee and Bones. Two things he couldn’t live without. It came as no surprise that a couple days in a cabin which contained nothing but coffee and Bones would be completely delightful. 

He found a pair of jeans on the floor and, a couple steps later, a flannel shirt which  _ had _ to belong to Bones, because every other second he was breathing in the scent of his cologne and the sleeves were a little too long and the shoulders too loose. He padded across the wooden floors into the kitchen, where he hoped to find one very sexy and surprisingly outdoorsy CMO, maybe even in a good enough shore-leave-sanctioned mood to be making him pancakes. He found no such thing. There was coffee, though, at least, in one of those classic coffee pots. It was still warm, and Jim decided he could live with the absence of pancakes. 

Still no Bones, though, which was strange. It had only been an hour or two since he rolled out of bed, planted a kiss on Jim’s half-asleep forehead and promptly chuckled and swatted his hand away when Jim tried to pull him back under the covers. And who could blame him? Bones on shore leave was somehow twice as irresistible as Bones on the ship. He was happy, and relaxed, and spontaneous, and warm. Also, he didn’t shave, and he didn’t put that gel in his hair to keep it out of his face during his shifts at the Med bay. Jim got the joy of both running his fingers through Bones’ soft, dark hair, and nuzzling his face against the very impressive beard he’d managed to grow in just five days. It was like Christmas morning. 

Which is why it was such an outrage that his unshaven and un-hair-gelled lover was  _ not _ around. Jim poured himself some coffee and went out to the little front porch of their cabin, where their tiny bit of paradise opened up to a gorgeous, seemingly endless woods. Both of them hadn’t been completely sold on the idea of going into the wilderness, instead of just staying at their place in San Francisco, but again, Spock had suggested a  _ complete _ shore leave, and Nyota clarified that this meant no Starfleet within a 100 mile radius  _ at least _ . 

_ They were both right _ , Jim thought again. He leaned his hip against the wooden fence that wrapped around the porch, looked out at the complete, encompassing forest around them, the green and the brown and the big blue sky. The weather was perfect, just chilly enough to make Jim wrap his borrowed flannel a little tighter around himself, to make the soles of his bare feet tingle against the floor of the porch, to send little curls of steam up from his coffee cup. He took a sip and the coffee was hot and strong and the air was fresh and the shirt around his shoulders smelled like Bones and he forgot for a second that there was even something missing from this morning. 

And then he looked up from his mug and spotted that  _ something _ , on the trail leading up to the cabin. He was dressed in another flannel--because he apparently owned multiple--he had a little knit beanie on his head which did nothing to hide how perfectly messy his hair was, his beard was another day longer, and he was carrying a paper grocery bag on his hip. 

Jim was so floored by such a complete and perfect rendition of the absolute love of his life that he honestly didn’t need the rest of the coffee to wake up. Bones caught his gaze as he walked closer and Jim saw the way he subtly picked up the pace, saw that private little curl at the corner of his mouth, the smile that wasn’t technically a smile, the smile that was all Jim’s and Jim’s alone. 

“Good morning,” he said when he’d made it to the steps leading up to the porch. “Figured you’d still be asleep.”

“I wanted pancakes,” was Jim’s reply, but really he was just filling the space while he waited until Bones was close enough to kiss. Then he grabbed the collar of that blue-and-green flannel he was wearing and pulled him forward and kissed him. Jim loved the gentle scrape of his beard and the smell of the woods and the way the ends of his hair tickled his forehead. His heart almost ached a little bit when he remembered this was temporary.

“I was gonna make you some.” Bones pulled back just enough to speak, his words ghosting over Jim’s mouth and making him want to close that distance right away. “Had to go to the store first.”

“My hero,” Jim said. 

Bones laughed and pressed their mouths together again, and this time Jim immediately deepened the kiss, sighing softly when Bones opened up his mouth against Jim’s. His free hand slipped into the open flannel Jim had picked up off the floor and never buttoned, maybe exactly for this reason, and Jim shivered at the cold touch of his palm against the small of his back and Bones only used that cold hand to pull him even closer. 

“You want those pancakes now?” he asked, nosing against the soft skin of Jim’s neck and collarbone and making Jim shiver all over again and, okay, he was definitely picking up on how much Jim liked the beard, that was for sure. Jim just pulled that beanie off of his head and slipped his fingers into his messy brown hair and pulled his head back up for another kiss. 

“I can wait,” he decided. 


	4. mckirk / urgency for sex / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i've been toying with the idea lately of joanna living on the enterprise. that's not what this chapter is REALLY about though, don't worry ;)

day 4: **urgency for sex**

Jim loves Joanna. It’s impossible not to. She’s simultaneously the complete opposite of Bones--full of endless, reckless energy and no fear--and also very clearly Bones’ child, based on the blunt, sometimes sarcastic way she speaks. She’s picked up on his linguistic habits as if she’s spent her entire childhood with him instead of just a few weeks out of the year. She even says things that Jim is sure he’s heard come out of Bones mouth plenty of times already, but in her little kid voice, his favorite being  _ are you out of your mind? _ delivered with the exact same sentiment as her father, just in a higher octave, and minus words like  _ damn _ or  _ god damn _ or  _ fucking _ . 

This is all mixed together in an adorable 8 year-old blonde-haired package who asks endless questions and refuses to leave Bones’ side, which is equal parts endearing and hilarious. Jim thought that he had been the one to perfect the art of irritating Bones while also being unconditionally loveable, but Joanna definitely proved herself as the master. It really turned out to be--and Jim didn’t just say this to appease Jocelyn over their twice-weekly video calls--an absolute  _ joy _ to have her on the Enterprise. 

But, after a full month of having her on board, he was done. 

Not because she was annoying. No, Jim was definitely going to miss having her around, watching her skip around the Medbay treating it as her own personal medical drama, spending evenings in his and Bones’ shared quarters where he got to make her watch all of the old movies he watched growing up, sitting on the bridge and hearing the kind of questions she would ask Spock and internally screaming at Spock’s reaction whenever she asked something literally unanswerable, like  _ Mr. Spock, what’s inside of a black hole?  _ Spock almost cracked halfway through her second week onboard. It was incredible. 

Still, Jim is more than ready for her to leave by week four, because it marked four weeks since the last time he and Bones had been alone together for more than one single minute. 

So it’s bittersweet, taking her back to Earth. A part of Jim wishes they had more time, that her school didn’t start again so soon so she could stay on the ship a little longer, spreading her light all over the place. A small part. The rest of Jim wants to fuck Bones. 

They ride the shuttle with her down to the port in Orlando, where Jocelyn’s going to pick her up and take her the rest of the way back home, and Jim can see how much Bones is going to miss her--how much he probably misses her already, the way he’s got his arm wrapped tightly around her, pulling her halfway out of her own seat and keeping her close to his side. After her first protest of  _ dad I can’t breathe _ and Bones’ subsequent refusal to let go, there was a little bit of laughter that echoed in the otherwise empty passenger section of the shuttle, and then silence. 

Jim doesn’t want to intrude on their parting-moment-before-the-parting-moment, and also he’s having trouble knowing what to say over the resounding chorus in his head of  _ must fuck Bones _ which has been slowly increasing in volume and tempo. 

He pretends to read something on his PADD while Bones and Joanna have their cuddle party right next to him, and then Bones reaches for his hand and he feels his heart stir just a little bit--partially at being included in the family scene, and also because holy  _ fuck _ he’s horny. 

The following half hour feels like it’s being lived by someone else. Jim has no idea how he manages to act casual through the whole thing, through greeting Jocelyn outside of the shuttle and telling her again how great it was to have Joanna on board, watching Joanna alternate between hugging her mom hello and her dad goodbye. He comes back to the present, for a few minutes, after Joanna comes up to give Jim his own goodbye hug, and can’t resist lifting her little sneaker-clad feet off of the ground and spinning her around until everyone starts laughing. 

And then they’re watching Joanna walk away with her mother, hearing her voice echo through the terminal as she starts recounting everything that’s happened since their last call a few days ago. She stops in her tracks before they have to walk through the doors and out of view, clever enough to know that her dad has been waiting this entire time to give her one last wave goodbye. Jocelyn offers a small wave of her own, and Jim feels his heart ache just a little bit, just at the thought of what Bones was feeling right now. An entire month with his daughter (almost) all to himself, and by the end of the day they’d probably be in separate star systems again. 

At least this is what Jim thought Bones would be thinking about while they waved their final goodbyes. Joanna and Jocelyn disappear through the sliding doors and Jim feels himself exhale like he’d been holding his breath for the last month. Then he turns to look at Bones, and freezes. 

Because Bones is looking at him--staring at him--like he’s trying to look through his uniform. Like he’s ready to tear it off of his body, possibly with his teeth. Like he’s maybe thinking about just pressing Jim against the back of the shuttle and fucking him right there against the cold, space-smooth metal. 

“Oh,” Jim says. 

The corner of Bones’ mouth ticks up, and he grabs Jim by the arm and just says, “Come with me.”

It has to be the most impatient mood Bones has ever been in on a shuttle--more so than their first couple of shuttle rides at the start of their mission when he acted like they were racing against death. This time, it’s more like he believes that their bed is going to self destruct if they don’t get there within 60 seconds of docking back in the Enterprise’s shuttle bay. 

Jim’s not even sure if the blood is still circulating in his arm as he’s dragged into the turbolift, and then Bones is pressing him against the wall with his entire body, and his mouth is there, against his, pressing kisses against his cheek and jaw and neck like he can’t possibly get enough. Jim decides he doesn’t care about his arm. 

His comm beeps as soon as Bones finds Jim’s mouth again, deepening the kiss with his tongue, and that’s just great. That’s perfect. 

“Ignore it.”

“Mmfprfh.”

“Say it’s broken.”

“That’d be lying.”

“Not if I break it for you.”

“I can’t--” Jim loses his train of thought at the feeling of Bones’ hands around his hips, warm and deliberate and pulling their bodies impossibly closer. Jim pants. “I can’t just ignore it. I’m the Captain.”

“Let Spock be in charge for 20 more minutes. I trust him.”

“Okay, now you’re sounding like a crazy person.”

Bones smiles, a little bit wickedly, and leans in for another kiss. Jim doesn’t know how he’s going to resist him like this, so sure and persistent and crowding him against the wall like he can’t even wait another  _ five minutes _ for the turbolift to get to their quarters. He’s always been an eager, attentive partner, but he hasn’t shown this kind of urgency since they first got together and everything was new and exciting and  _ all the time _ . 

“Bones,” Jim breathes against his mouth, and Bones just hums in response, and slides his hand firmly up Jim’s back, almost like a massage, and god Jim loves it when he does that. 

His comm beeps again. 

“Bones, I have to.”

Bones sighs, finally, and puts enough space between them for Jim to fish his comm out of his pocket. He gives Bones a deliberate look while he flips it open, hoping to convey the message of  _ if this is Spock and you make me horny during the conversation I will never forgive you _ . Bones just stares back with a seemingly endless hunger in his eyes, one hand still holding Jim’s hip. 

“Kirk here.”

“Captain. I trust you and Doctor McCoy have returned to the Enterprise?”

It was Spock. Jim’s brain was having trouble processing the sound of Spock’s voice in his ear and the expression on Bones’ face as they continued to make eye contact. Bones mouths the words  _ say no _ and Jim almost snorts. 

“Yes, we’re on board.”

“If you could return to the bridge, we have just received a distress call from the Sigma Quadrant.”

Jim puts his comm on mute so he can sigh and it comes out as more of a whimper. 

“You have to go, don’t you,” Bones says quietly. He’s disappointed, but he understands, because of course he does.

“It could be something bad.”

“Could be. Sigma Quadrant’s pretty far from here, though.”

“I don’t really have an excuse not to go up there right away.”

Bones seems to consider this for a moment, tilts his head to the side like he’s weighing out a particular idea, and then apparently makes up his mind and leans over to hit the ALL STOP button on the turbolift. 

“Broken turbolift?” He suggests, right as Spock pipes up with another question of, 

“Captain?”

Jim clears his throat, holds his hand up to signal that Bones should stay quiet, and says, “Put us en route. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Very well.”

Jim hangs up the call. Bones is on him again before he can even try to say something like  _ we can’t take too long or people will get suspicious _ . The words pretty much disappear from his brain as soon as he feels Bones’ mouth on his neck and his hand against the front of his pants, reminding Jim exactly how hard he is and  _ exactly _ how long it’s been since they’ve touched each other like this. 

“Okay,” Jim says, to Bones, and also to the universe, to the concept of fucking in a turbolift. 

He’s actually never done it before. 

Bones just continues to trail kisses all over his neck, his jaw, finding his way back to his mouth. He’s palming at Jim’s cock through his slacks, pressure just on the edge of  _ too much too soon _ which only serves to make Jim’s head spin. And he sounds like--god--he’s practically shaking with every breath, his chest heaving against Jim’s like he wants him so bad he can’t keep still.  _ That _ alone makes Jim feel like he might go insane. All he can do is hold on, pull Bones closer until he can feel every inch of his body against his own, grabbing at his shoulders, his back, the curve of his ass like his hands can’t decide where to go. It’s amazing, Jim thinks. Everything about it is amazing. Distantly, he realizes that they weren’t even  _ half _ as eager when it actually was their first time having sex. 

Jim feels dangerously close to orgasm already just from the sight of Bones sinking to his knees, but he wants it so bad--wants whatever Bones will give him--that he doesn’t even try to hold himself back. 

He can get over it later if he comes at the first touch of Bones’ lips to his cock. Two sets of hands scramble to get Jim’s slacks open, and then Jim has no idea what to even  _ do _ with his hands as soon as he feels the heat of Bones’ mouth around him. He tangles his fingers into the longer hair at the top of his head and resists the urge to let his eyes close from the sensation, because the view was fucking otherworldly. Bones on his knees, in full uniform, under the bright lights of the turbolift, just a little bit flushed and looking up at Jim through his lashes while his mouth moves steadily up and down the length of Jim’s cock. 

His eyes flutter closed as he hollows his cheeks and takes all of Jim into his mouth, and then he moans around Jim’s cock, and Jim is pretty sure he might die from this, actually. 

He doesn’t last much longer than that. Only a few more seconds, and then he’s coming into Bones’ perfect, tight mouth, biting his fist like he’s afraid someone might hear them through the soundproof walls of the turbolift. Bones doesn’t stop the steady motion of his mouth, the slide of his tongue, and then Jim starts to blink back to life and has to urge Bones off of his cock with shaking hands. 

Bones sits back on his heels, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and breathes out a laugh at how completely wrecked Jim is now. Just minutes after they got into this turbolift, and now he’s totally spent and sagging against the wall and also, probably, something of a fainting risk. 

Jim struggles to get his heart rate back to normal and looks down again when he feels Bones’s hands on him. He gently tucks him back into his slacks and does the zipper, like this was routine or something. Jim’s trying to get his mouth to form words as he watches Bones smile up at him and then stand up and turn the turbolift back on. 

“You--Bones,” he finally manages, and Bones turns back to look at him, one eyebrow raised in amusement. He still has that smile on his face, the one he always gets when he successfully breaks Jim’s brain, which he seems to have done today in record time. Jim wants nothing more than to fall forward into his arms and kiss him and be carried to bed. Except,

“Bones--you didn’t--”

Bones cringes just slightly, and that’s when Jim’s eyes flick down his body to where he expects to see him tenting the front of his slacks. Instead he sees a small patch where the fabric has gone darker, almost as if--

“Holy shit.”

“Don’t worry about me,” Bones breathes as he closes in on Jim, one last time because the turbolift is almost to the bridge now. He kisses the shock off of Jim’s face before moving to stand next to him, casually clasping his hands in front and shifting his facial expression from sexy to professional in five seconds flat. 

Jim is nowhere near regaining that level of composure, but he doesn’t have a choice. The doors finally open and he pushes himself off of the wall, tries not to outright stumble onto the bridge even though his legs still feel boneless. 

He turns back to Bones to give him one final nod, hoping that the gesture manages to communicate how much sex they’re going to be having as soon as this distress call is handled. 

The corner of Bones’ mouth ticks up, and he somehow puts an even stronger implication into his voice when he says the words, “Duty calls,” and keeps eye contact with Jim right until the doors close again. Jim lets out a long exhale.

“Captain?” Spock calls to him. 

“Yeah,” he clears his throat, tries his best to straighten his posture and get his mind out of the gutter, “Yeah, I’m coming.”


	5. mckirk / heartfelt serenade / G

day 5: **heartfelt serenade**

Nobody could have predicted that the drinks on Risa were going to be  _ that _ strong. Or that Ensign Chekov--who had apparently been here before on his  _ own _ accord--was going to drag everyone down the street into a smoky little karaoke bar about three rounds in. Jim’s body felt loose and his mouth was apparently looser when he agreed to pay for a private karaoke lounge. 

And then the whole bridge crew (and a couple other crewmen who saw the opportunity for blackmail and took it) was shoved into a dark little room with a one-person stage, a floor-to-ceiling screen, and a leather couch that wrapped around the rest of the wall and definitely had been the location to some greater sins than just off-key karaoke singing. 

So, obviously, it was the best night Jim had had since they set out on this mission,  _ including _ their last two shore leaves. 

“Should I put a stop to this?” Christine asked in his ear, after (presumably) having stepped over the long row of people sitting to his right. Jim didn’t know. He wasn’t watching. His eyes were absolutely glued to the stage right now. 

“I can sober him up with one hypo, you know.”

“Don’t,” Jim managed to say. He was otherwise speechless. 

Because on the stage right now, in front of a crowd of people who all took orders from him, Leonard H. McCoy, the CMO of the Enterprise, _ Jim’s _ CMO--Jim’s everything, really--was very,  _ very _ drunk. And he was singing. 

All Jim could do was watch, eyes wide, not even bothering to touch his drink anymore. He was too busy trying to commit every single second of the next few minutes to memory. 

He almost wished Leonard had picked a longer song than  _ Home on the Range _ , maybe something in the 7+ minute mark, but he honestly couldn’t have picked a better song for Leonard to drunkenly belt out in front of all of their coworkers if he’d tried. 

What made it great was that nobody had ever heard this old-ass song, judging by their confused looks. Everyone except Jim. Because this song, centuries-old about the kind of frontier wilderness that Leonard had definitely _ never  _ witnessed in his upbringing, was in fact Leonard’s go-to drunk song. Jim had heard it at least a dozen times since they became friends on that shuttle ride to the Academy. He’d even seen Leonard perform the karaoke version once or twice already, heard him humming it under his breath while they walked back to the dorms after a long Saturday night, witnessed him mumbling the lyrics on the nights Jim made too many mistakes, as if he believed in his liquor-steeped brain that it would make it better. 

This had to be the best version Jim had ever heard, maybe because it had been so long since they got stupid drunk like they always used to, especially since the  _ first _ time they got stupid drunk. Six years since that shuttle ride to San Francisco. Three years since the Narada. Two years since they took the Enterprise out into space. Eight months since they realized they’d basically been in some sort of gray area between  _ best friends _ and  _ lovers  _ the entire time. 

“You sure?” Christine asked again, and Jim barely even registered her in his ear when Leonard started singing with extra passion in his voice, looking up at the ceiling of the tiny karaoke lounge like he could see the entire universe spread out above them, shouting into the microphone and the lights were dim but Jim could see the messy way his hair fell across his forehead and the flush in his cheeks and the happy, relaxed curve of his shoulders as he unknowingly embarrassed himself into the next star system.

_ How often at night, when the heavens are bright _

_ With the light of the glittering stars _

_ I stand there amazed, and ask as I gaze _

_ If their glory exceeds that of ours? _

“Let the man sing,” Jim whispered, almost reverently, and heard a snort from Christine. She reached for his drink from the table in front of them and passed it to him. 

“You are so in love with him.”

Jim wouldn’t have tried to deny it even if he was sober. He felt himself grinning as Leonard finished the final verse, and then knocked back the rest of his crazy Risan cocktail and cupped his hands around his mouth to shout  _ ENCORE! _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yall i don't even know.


	6. mckirk / biting / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> short and sweet ;)

day 6: **biting**

“F-fuck...oh my god--” Jim cut off, his head falling back against the pillows. Leonard just smiled. Ever since he’d discovered how easy it was to turn Jim not just into a mess, but a stuttering mess--which was really worth something considering how much this kid  _ talked _ \--he found it was near impossible to control himself. 

Well,  _ easy  _ wasn’t the word so much as  _ simple _ . 

Jim Kirk had very sensitive thighs. They mostly figured this out by accident, back during one of those holiday breaks at the Academy when they were granted the simple joy of being Starfleet Cadets who were allowed, for a limited time, to go without shaving. It only took a few days before Leonard picked up on the way Jim squirmed and gasped at the drag of his stubble against his inner thigh, almost moaning from the sensation even though his mouth hadn’t even reached Jim’s cock yet. He tested it, then, looked Jim right in the eyes as he leaned in, mouth slightly open, almost giving him what he wanted until Jim nearly went red in the face waiting for it. And then he bypassed his cock completely, bent one of Jim’s legs with a hand under the back of his knee, and pressed a kiss into the smooth, pale skin on the inside of his thigh. A kiss with just a little bit of teeth. More of a hickey, maybe. 

Jim moaned, for real, and Leonard’s theory was confirmed. 

Now, he took advantage of it as often as possible. Not  _ every _ time they had sex, because that would ruin the fun. But every once in a while, after the kind of shift that’s so tiring they all but collapse into bed next to each other, or after one of those away missions with a real close call that turns Jim neurotic and jittery for hours afterwards, or, sometimes, just because. 

“Please--I...I want-t…”

“Want what, darlin?” Leonard asked, and didn’t wait for him to respond before sucking another mark into that soft patch of skin, feeling the lean muscles of his thigh shake and tense under the graze of his teeth. He could see Jim’s chest heaving out of the corner of his eye. 

Leonard smiled against his skin when he heard his next breath break off into a strangled sort of moan, and soothed the spot with his tongue until Jim’s entire body was shaking. 

It was even better than leaving hickeys on his neck or his collarbone, because there were no limits, no worries about something peeking above the line of Jim’s uniform. He could spend forever biting and nipping and sucking bruises and cover the sensitive skin of Jim’s thighs with them, until Jim was desperate with need, barely capable of even forming the words to ask for more. And then even after he made him come and the sex was over, he got to think about Jim sitting in the Captain’s chair through all of his hours-long shifts for the following week, crossing and uncrossing his legs and trying not to let the pressure against those pretty bruises make him hard again right there on the bridge. 

“ _ Please, _ ” Jim breathed, one last time, as the trail of Leonard’s lips and teeth and tongue came even closer to his cock. Leonard pressed one last kiss to his thigh, over the bites and the bruises that marked this part of Jim as _ his _ , this smooth skin which went untouched by the rest of the universe underneath his uniform. Then he turned his head to take Jim’s cock fully in his mouth. 


	7. mckirk / bodyswap / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay i nearly gave myself a stroke trying to write the descriptions for this. so. it might be a rough one. you've been warned

day 7: **bodyswap**

They knew something was wrong as soon as they rematerialized in the transporter room. Something just felt...off. Not like, an-organ-is-in-the-wrong-place off, more like  _ everything _ -is-in-the-wrong-place off. Jim remembered immediately looking down at his hands, and seeing his shirtsleeves, first. Bright blue. And then big, slightly-callused hands, familiar hands, but not his, soft from being washed again and again during shifts in the Medbay, and--oh no. 

Jim looked up, to his left, at Leonard--well, at himself. At Leonard in  _ his  _ body, he assumed. Because he was _ definitely _ in Leonard’s right now and holy fuck this was  _ so _ weird. Leonard--Jim--was staring right back, wide eyed, apparently speechless, and now Jim understood where he was always coming from when he would say  _ wipe that dumb look off your face already _ because, to be honest, he did look pretty dumb right now. 

Thankfully it only took a few seconds of eye contact for them to establish that even though this situation was entirely unbelievable, they both knew what was going on. 

“Captain?” came Scotty’s voice from behind the controls, already a little concerned after the two of them had stood silently on the transporter pad for at least a minute now, just staring at each other the whole time. “Everything alright?”

The question went completely ignored by Leonard, who was technically the Captain right now. Jim cleared his throat. 

“Everything alright, Captain?” he asked quietly, even though he knew Leonard would never in a million years call him that, but saying  _ Jim _ would have been too weird, on top of how fucking weird it already was hearing Leonard’s voice come out of his mouth. 

Jim saw his own eyes widen in realization. 

“Yes.” The word came out slowly, like Leonard was not only in an entirely new body, but also perhaps attempting to speak for the very first time. “I’m fine, Scotty. Bones...why don’t you escort me to Sickbay.”

Leonard nodded at him, eyes still wide, and god, he was such a bad liar. It made Jim’s dumb, shocked expression look even dumber. Jim cleared his throat and it came out way louder and way deeper than he intended.

“Well. Let’s go.”

They basically ran to Sickbay from there, made a beeline for Leonard’s office, and locked the doors behind them. 

“What the fuck,” were the next words out of Jim’s mouth, and he was so entertained now by the fact that they were coming out in Leonard’s voice that he just  _ had _ to say it again. “What the fuck. Holy hell. What in tarnation.”

“Stop that.”

“Yeehaw.”

“Jim.”

“Well, I’ll be.”

“I’m going to kill you.”

Jim collapsed into the chair behind Leonard’s desk, feeling the extra weight in his body, the subtle differences in how his body moved and how it felt against gravity. It had to be psychosomatic, but Leonard’s body seemed to operate like it was trying extra hard to stay on the ground at all times, afraid of floating away somehow. He felt like his feet should be sinking into the floor. 

His ass was definitely sinking into the chair right now. He shifted a little bit, and then reached back and felt the shape of it with his hand.  _ That, _ he’d admit, was pretty nice actually. Jim had felt Leonard’s ass before, but the combination of having the pleasure of touching it while also being able to feel the--

“Stop it.”

Jim sighed and paused his exploration of Leonard’s body. Leonard--Jim, god this was so surreal--was standing on the other side of the desk, still, hands clenched at his sides, looking extremely uncomfortable, and starting to blush. 

Jim wasn’t the kind of guy who blushed from embarrassment, but then, he wasn’t the kind of guy to get embarrassed, so he hadn’t known he was capable of turning red outside of the bedroom. He laughed out loud. 

“Loosen up, Bones!” he said, and laughed again at the sound of Leonard’s nickname in Leonard’s voice. “This is so crazy. I don’t think it’s ever happened before.”

“ _ That’s why I’m stressed, Jim, _ ” Leonard gritted out, and seeing the expression on Jim’s own face, that look of near-agonizing stress that Leonard could usually pull off pretty well, was so fucking hilarious. It didn’t even look like it was Jim’s face with all those lines of tension in it. And Leonard’s words in Jim’s voice, well, that was a whole other thing. Both of them just sounded like they were doing shitty impressions of each other. 

“This has never happened and for all  _ we _ know there’s no way to fix it!”

“Relax, I’m sure we can figure something out. We’ll get Spock on it.”

“ _ Spock?? _ ” Leonard demanded, and Jim could only imagine Spock’s reaction if he actually said his name like that on the bridge and ended up doubled over and wheezing to catch his breath. The sound of Leonard’s own unrestrained laughter coming out only made things worse. By the time Jim looked up again he saw himself trying not to smile, unsuccessfully trying to hold a frown in a way he was so used to seeing on Leonard. 

Jim stood up, and was reminded again how much bigger Leonard was, how much heavier and stronger and he felt like he was stomping when he walked back around the desk, where Leonard was standing in a very awkward and frustrated and confused looking version of Jim’s body. 

“It’s going to be fine,” Jim said, enjoying the chance to use Leonard’s soothing doctor-voice. He reached forward and held himself by the shoulders. For a split second he was reminded of how weird this was, touching his body with someone else’s body. And then he thought,  _ damn, I’ve got nice shoulders _ . His touch which was intended to be comforting very quickly turned exploratory. Jim felt a curious little satisfaction both at the width of Leonard’s hands he used to touch himself and at the feeling of his shoulders and his arms through the fabric of his gold uniform. 

“Stop that.”

“I’m trying to soothe your worries,  _ darlin, _ ” Jim drawled, delighted in his ability to replicate the sound of Leonard’s pet name for him. Leonard squirmed out of his reach. 

“You are such a narcissist,” he grumbled, wrapping his arms across his chest like he’d just been scandalized. “This is turning you on, isn’t it? Well I’ll have you know I’m having no fun whatsoever. I’m freaking out. Are you into that? Does that get your dick hard?”

“This situation definitely has potential for that, I’ll admit. But not the part about you freaking out. Seeing myself looking like such an anxious mess is kind of a boner-killer.”

It was really hard not to laugh at the word  _ boner-killer _ coming out of Leonard’s mouth, but Jim was now being full on glared at by Leonard-in-Jim’s-body while he furiously crossed his arms around himself. It was like Jim’s smaller frame was incapable of housing the sheer weight and intensity of Leonard McCoy’s stress. 

Jim sighed. This really could have been fun, in theory. Maybe even sexy. But Leonard looked about two seconds away from losing it and that kind of took precedence. He reached for him again, just for his hands this time, unraveling his own arms from around his chest. Leonard glared at the ground, probably to avoid having to look up and see himself instead of Jim. 

“Look, it’s gonna be okay,” Jim said, trying his best to keep his voice sounding neutral, like maybe he wasn’t in Leonard’s body but someone else’s. “We’ll fix it. I’m gonna call Spock. Everything will go back to normal.”

Leonard snorted. Jim watched the slump of his shoulders in command gold before he finally lifted his head. And then he had to remember where he was going with this pep talk before his brain short circuited from making eye contact with himself for too long. He had to remind himself that this was  _ Leonard _ , in his body, that it wasn’t one of those mornings in his bathroom mirror saying bullshit affirmations like Pike told him to do. 

“Although I guess you’ll hate using the transporters even more after this.”

Leonard’s mouth curled up a little bit into a smile, in a way that was so unmistakable, it couldn’t have been anyone else in Jim’s body except for him. 

“And here I thought it was impossible for me to hate them more.”

Jim felt himself smiling, could feel the subtle differences in the way his face moved, but it must have been enough of a Jim Kirk Smile for him to witness Leonard relaxing further. 

“We’ll fix this,” he said again, squeezing Leonard’s hands in--well, in his  _ own _ . Leonard let out a slow breath and then nodded, trusting Jim completely, and Jim wanted nothing more than to kiss him. But he wanted to kiss  _ Leonard _ Leonard, not himself with Leonard’s brain. What seemed to have sexy potential before was now more of an obstacle. 

“What?”

“I really want to kiss you right now, but not like, because you’re  _ me _ . I don’t know--I’m getting really sexually confused.”

Leonard rolled his eyes--looking even more like himself despite Jim’s softer features and blond hair and blue eyes--and shook his head, and said, “Just close your eyes, you moron.”

“Good point.”

So he closed his eyes, and leaned in. Aside from the subtle height difference, from the realization that Leonard actually had to tilt his chin  _ up _ to reach Jim’s mouth when they kissed, and the sensation of a different face than he was used to, it felt like kissing Leonard. Jim hadn’t even realized he was worried about the situation too until he felt himself relax and melt into the kiss. 

“Should we call Spock?” he asked, gently breaking the kiss but not opening his eyes yet. They still only touched hands, maybe wary of things getting even weirder if their bodies got close enough to touch. But it was more than enough for Jim. Kissing Leonard was always more than enough. 

“Yeah. In a minute,” Leonard said, and maybe being in Jim’s body was making him a little more reckless and a little more brave than usual, because he grabbed Jim’s face with both hands and pulled him forward to bring their mouths together once more. 


	8. mckirk / dancing / T

day 8: **dancing**

Jim was getting more beautiful every day. 

Well, that wasn’t exactly it. Jim was always beautiful. Leonard had never been afraid to admit this out loud, even, calling him names like  _ pretty boy _ , sometimes as a joke and sometimes just to see the way Jim would flush and laugh and look down at his feet (although Leonard didn’t know, back then, that this is why he did it). 

Maybe Leonard was just paying more attention, every day, to how beautiful Jim was. That had to be what was going on. Every day he noticed something new about the way the bright lights on the bridge fell across the planes of his face, about the way he walked, about the sound of his voice, clear and commanding on shipwide announcements and then casual, intimate, across the couch in Jim’s quarters. Every day Jim’s eyes were brighter, and Leonard got a little more lost in them. 

It was one of the reasons he had really been looking forward to this impromptu pit stop Jim decided to make at the colony on Vega, so the crew could let off some steam after a good nine months without shore leave. Leonard had been ready to find somewhere quiet--somewhere with non-replicated liquor, even--and forget about Jim’s eyes and his face and his easy smiles for the night. 

Somehow, he ended up in the exact opposite scenario. Blame it on those exact eyes that reflected the damn stars and made it impossible to say no, that smile that broke across Jim’s face and all but pulled Leonard into the bar with him like it was producing its own gravity. And now Leonard was in some sort of a dance hall, where it was _ not _ quiet, and the drinks didn’t taste right, and the worst part was that he couldn’t even be mad about it. Not with the way Jim spent the entire evening by his side. Leonard would have followed him into a fucking karaoke bar if it meant getting this kind of undivided attention. 

It was one thing when they were hanging out in his or Jim’s quarters at the end of a long shift, too exhausted to do anything but sit there and too wired to be alone. But this bar was packed, and people everywhere were dancing, young, good-looking people who were probably already staring at Jim at the bar and wishing he’d come over. 

Maybe Jim was just tired, tonight. Or--no, Leonard realized he didn’t really want to question it. He just sat and listened to Jim talk about his draft of the latest mission report, his issues regarding culturally-sensitive word choice for a species which refused to apply for the UFP after Jim denied their request to  _ purchase _ some of their crew members. Distantly, Leonard felt himself laughing at the subtle attitude in Jim’s voice, his utterly dry tone as he listed off some of the more Prime-Directive sounding sentences he’d come up with. And then they were just laughing, drinking brightly-colored ridiculously-named cocktails and it was like Leonard was the only person Jim knew in this bar, the way he didn’t even bother letting his eyes wander around the room. Leonard stared down at his drink in his hand until the vibrating of his heart died down again. 

“I wanna dance,” Jim said. 

Leonard looked up, ready for Jim to reveal that this is some sort of punchline. Jim looked serious. He snorted. 

“Well? Go dance.”

“Can’t.”

“Never stopped you before,” Leonard said into his glass, but he could tell Jim heard it because he smiled and rolled his eyes and shook his head. Leonard finished his drink. 

“No,  _ dickhead _ , I mean I’m not  _ allowed _ to dance.”

It must have shown on his face that Leonard didn’t get what he was talking about at all. Jim held his gaze for a few more seconds, something completely unreadable in his expression, and then dragged a hand down his face and looked out, finally, at the dance floor around them. 

“Starfleet regs are pretty strict about fraternization,” he explained, sounding more resigned than bitter, “For good reason, obviously. Doesn’t mean being Captain isn’t a lonely job sometimes.”

Leonard chewed at his bottom lip while he watched that faraway expression on Jim’s face. It wasn’t like they  _ didn’t _ ever talk about this stuff. They talked about everything. Being Jim Kirk’s friend basically required that all conversation topics had to be fair game. It just had been awhile since either of them admitted to what was going on in their love lives. Almost since the first time Leonard had caught Jim’s eye across the bridge one shift and felt the weight of those few seconds of eye contact on his chest for the rest of the day. Maybe he’d been subconsciously steering them away from this kind of conversation ever since. 

He tried his best to be the supportive friend he was supposed to be. 

“There’s gotta be people in here who are from the colony. Not that the lighting’s good enough to tell the difference anyway.”

Not as supportive as he would have been a year or two ago, probably. Jim turned his head to the side and seemed to study Leonard for a moment. Leonard wanted to look away, order another drink, sweep his eyes across the bar and find someone for Jim to dance with. But he couldn’t. He felt like he was waiting for something, and he didn’t know what. 

“Why don’t  _ you _ dance with me?” Jim asked, just loud enough that Leonard couldn’t pretend he’d only imagined those words coming out of his mouth. 

He wanted to laugh it off; he couldn’t seem to do that either.

“Why me?” was all he could manage to say, and he immediately wanted to kick himself for asking it like that, for acting like Jim’s invitation to dance was from anything other than friendship and alcohol and loneliness. 

“You’re my CMO. The only person on the ship with the authority to declare me unfit for duty. I think that counts as a loophole.”

Leonard was able to laugh, then, softly on his next breath. It covered up the fact that he’d nearly turned red just from the words  _ my CMO _ . As if it meant anything, paired with the rest of what he said which amounted to  _ you’re the only person I can legally dance with _ . 

“I think you’re taking the rules a little more seriously than most people do. I’m sure anyone here would be happy to dance with you for the night.”

Jim had changed a lot in the last few years, since finishing his training at the Academy, speeding up the ranks and getting the Enterprise, learning to handle the weight of leading a starship of people through uncharted space every day. But one thing hadn’t changed. He loved getting his ego stroked. He grinned and quirked his eyebrows at the compliment, basking in it in a way Leonard was sure he used to find somewhat annoying. Now it just made him stupid and lovesick and pissed off because he  _ wanted _ to compliment Jim, to  _ really _ compliment him, to tell him all the idiotic and sappy thoughts he seemed to have every damn  _ day _ now, every moment they were together and nearly every moment they were apart. 

Jim’s face turned serious again, though, just a second later. 

“So dance with me,” he said. 

Leonard couldn’t say no. He couldn’t even  _ think _ the word no when Jim’s hand curled around his arm and pulled him off the bar and into the crowded dance floor. 

It wasn’t like they were pressed up against each other, or anything. Mostly they just swayed to the music, careful not to bump elbows with the people around them. Jim smiled so wide whenever their eyes met that Leonard literally had no fucking  _ choice  _ not to start enjoying it. They danced like they used to during weekends at the Academy, when they were younger, and they drank more, and their course load left them too strung out to be embarrassed. 

Anyone who didn’t bother to get to know Jim in the Academy would say that he was a completely different person now. In fact, Leonard had  _ heard _ people say this. It wasn’t true at all. 

That impulsive bastard who’d joined Starfleet on a dare when he was 22 and bored had everything in him to become the capable, admirable Captain he was today. Leonard had seen it before they even became friends, really. Maybe that was what drew him to Jim in the first place, when he was in a shitstorm of his own. Jim was smart, and kind, and thoughtful, and his heart was big enough to hold the entire universe inside of it. He was always this way. Only now, he didn’t try to hide it underneath sarcastic grins and scraped knuckles. Somehow Leonard didn’t mind at all that the soft, kind parts of Jim weren’t only  _ his _ anymore. Seeing Jim lead with grace and sensitivity and compassion, all without losing an ounce of his authority, made Leonard’s heart dig itself an even deeper hole every time. 

And here was Jim, tonight, inches away, laughing and dancing like he used to years ago, simultaneously reminding Leonard of who he used to be and showing him who he’s become, and Leonard didn’t think it was possible for Jim to be so beautiful. 

Then Jim smiled again, wide and a little bit goofy, and took Leonard’s hand in his own to jokingly twirl himself around. When he finally stopped twirling, letting Leonard’s arm wind around his torso, and looked into his eyes underneath the dim, changing lights of the dance floor, Leonard’s heart stopped like he was seeing Jim for the first time, or maybe it stopped because he’d seen him for the millionth time. 

“Kiss me,” Jim whispered, face so close to Leonard’s now that his breath tickled Leonard’s cheek. 

Maybe Jim was lonely. And tired. And he’d had too many of those frilly cocktails which were all named after constellations. Maybe it was just because he cared about being Captain more than he’d ever care about actually finding someone, because Leonard was his loophole, because Leonard was there and he had his arm around Jim’s waist. Maybe this would mean nothing to Jim. 

Leonard figured he could let his future self worry about all that shit. 

Jim’s lips were warm and sweet from liquor and Leonard could feel the shape of his smile as he kissed him, the rise and fall of his chest where he stood pressed against Leonard’s body, the trail of his hand as he felt for Leonard’s hip and held tighter. 

And Jim leaned into the kiss, and opened his mouth to Leonard and slid his hand around to the small of his back and Leonard wondered if it would really be so bad, to be nothing but Jim’s loophole. 


	9. mckirk / first kiss / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> what's this???? MORE pining????? it can't be

day 9: **first kiss**

It isn’t even a bad sprain. 

Bones has been there to patch up Jim’s injuries for years now, since right after they met, basically, when he saw the dried blood still on Jim’s shirt during the shuttle ride to the Academy and insisted on taking a look at his scrapes and bruises from that barfight the night before. Since then he’s seen Jim at his worst, time and time again, he’s seen him nearly dead, he’s sewn him back together and repaired his bones and regenerated his skin more times than Jim has bothered to remember. 

At this point, a sprain in his wrist from a poorly-landed fall during the away mission earlier today shouldn’t even merit a sarcastic lecture about  _ learning how to fall right, since you do it all the damn time _ . It’s the kind of thing Bones normally just scoffs at and fixes without even stopping to ask how he got it. 

But today is different for some reason. Some reason which Jim can’t quite figure out, while he sits with his legs dangling off the biobed and his arm stretched out for Bones to treat. He’s bitching about the sprain and the cuts on Jim’s wrist and palm like Jim had nearly killed himself. 

“It was just a fall, Bones,” Jim interrupts, finally, and he wants to laugh at the exasperated sigh that makes its way out of Bones’ mouth, as if Jim was somehow  _ understating  _ the damage. The skin was cut and his wrist hurt a little bit. Before Starfleet, before Bones, Jim wouldn’t have bothered to get it treated at all. 

“Just a fall, my ass,” Bones grumbles, “do you know how many times I’ve had to fix your wrist in this spot? You need to be more careful with your form otherwise you’re gonna really break it one of these days, and then I’m not gonna be so nice about it when I’m reassembling your bones.”

He’s hardly being nice about it now. He doesn’t seem to care that Jim is flinching in discomfort as he cleans the cuts on his hand and wrist with anti-bac. 

Jim wants to whine, to play up the pain even more just to get a rise out of Bones. It’s his usual routine whenever he’s got a small injury like this, but Bones’ overreacting today doesn’t seem like it’s part of that bit. It almost feels like it’s coming from an entirely new place. 

So he sits patiently while Bones finishes cleaning his cuts, doesn’t comment on the pins-and-needles sensation of the dermo-regenerator. But he shivers when he feels Bones’ hands, warm and steady over the soft, new skin on the inside of his wrist, he looks at the still-annoyed expression in Bones’ face as he resets the sprain, and he wonders when things suddenly became different. He wonders how he’d missed it. 

“Is this really about my wrist, or is it about something else?” Jim asks quietly, even though he doesn’t have to in the otherwise empty Medbay. 

He can see that Bones is unsure of the answer himself. His brow furrows and he focuses even more on Jim’s wrist, even though Jim knows that this is the kind of thing Bones can definitely multitask. 

“It  _ is  _ about your wrist, Jim. It’s about how I’m tired of seein you hurt yourself in the same places over and over again.”

Jim bites his lip. Bones isn’t going to make this easy, he realizes. Even though, in theory, this could be so so easy. As easy as Bones giving up his angry-worry act and simply saying  _ be careful _ in that gentle tone of voice that Jim  _ knows _ is only for him, even if Bones hasn’t realized it himself yet. As easy as closing the distance between them, which would only take a second, because Bones really doesn’t need to be standing so close to treat his wrist, except that he is. 

“You’ve been seeing me get hurt for years already. I figured if you were gonna break it would have happened a while ago.”

Bones scoffs, still staring closely at Jim’s wrist. Jim can tell he’s being meticulous on purpose, dragging this out, making sure he has something to look at and something to do and maybe hoping that Jim will drop the conversation by the time he’s done. 

“I know it’s not a complicated injury,” Jim says softly, “Look at me.”

And Bones raises his head to look at Jim, and his brow is still furrowed and there’s still the hard set in his jaw, but Jim can see a softness, maybe even a little bit of fear, in his eyes. 

“What is this about?” Jim’s voice is still low. He tries not to put any implications in his tone. Bones is one of the most emotionally intelligent and expressive people he’s ever met, but if  _ this _ kind of thing came easily to him he wouldn’t be passive aggressively treating Jim’s wrist and they’d already be kissing instead. 

Or they would have been kissing already for a long time, Jim realizes. 

Bones cards a hand through his hair, still holding Jim’s wrist with the other one. 

“You,” he says.

He looks like the word itself was some sort of grand confession of love, the way his face starts to turn red. And then he sees Jim starting to smile and rolls his eyes and furrows his brow a little more. Jim is sure he’s never seen anything more adorable in his life than Bones angrily confessing that he cares about him. 

But his smile must have been a little too wide and a little too knowing because Bones left it at that and went right back to treating Jim’s wrist. Even though Jim had witnessed him fix a torn ligament before in less than five minutes. His visit to the Medbay was now bordering on twenty. 

“Do you worry about me?”

“Of course I do,” Bones mutters. 

“Why is this taking so long?”

“Be quiet.”

“You’ve fixed a sprain for me before like it was an afterthought.”

“Well, this time is different, I guess.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re  _ safe in here _ ,” Bones finally snaps, the words rushing out like his mouth was trying to outrun his mind, “And I’m tired of seeing you walk out of Medbay and havin to wonder what the hell you’re gonna get into. How bad you’ll get hurt. Who you’ll run into. It’s goddamn distracting is what it is. I don’t wanna make a habit of joining the away team every time just because I wanna keep you safe.”

Jim is….speechless. 

And now they’re both blushing, and Bones is still pretending that Jim’s wrist needs such an unnecessary level of attention to detail, and Jim loves the feeling of his fingertips on his palm, his wrist, the back of his hand, sure and steady and maybe a little bit too attentive--but he needs to do something about this before he goes insane. 

He pulls his hand out of Bones’ reach. 

Unsurprisingly, this causes Bones’ head to snap up, glaring at him, but before he can form his mouth around a complaint about Jim being an insufferable patient today, Jim leans forward, tilts his head up, and kisses him. 

What’s unexpected is how quickly Bones gets on board, drops the regenerator onto the bed next to Jim so he can have his hands free, so he can step forward in between Jim’s legs and take his face gently into his hands and kiss him back so deeply that Jim is pretty sure the biobed will pick up on his arousal in a few seconds and start beeping at them. 

It does, but Bones doesn’t even flinch. Instead, he slips his tongue into Jim’s mouth. 

Jim wonders how the hell they got here. 

He realizes he doesn’t care. 

He slides his hand around to the small of Bones’ back and pulls him even closer, as close as possible, trying to make it clear that he never, ever wants this kiss to end. This kiss which is sweet and sure, just like Bones’ hands around his wrist. Sweet, and sure, and quickly turning a little bit dirty. At the next nip of Bones’ teeth at his bottom lip Jim gasps and tilts his head just enough to separate their mouths, pressing their foreheads together. 

They both just breathe, for a second. 

“Can you actually fix my wrist, now, because I think I wanna use it for something tonight.”

This earns a little huff of a laugh from Bones which he can feel as much as hear and it just makes him want to press their mouths and their bodies together again. Bones’ thumbs are tracing the lines of his cheekbones, fingertips gentle at the back of his neck, like Jim’s head in his hands is something so valuable. 

“Can you blame me for wanting to take my time?” Bones asks. 

Jim decides his wrist can wait for just a little bit longer. 


	10. mckirk / secret crush / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so aisha inspired me with her own version of this prompt and i basically stole the idea and reversed the roles. go read her day 10 its amazing!!

day 10: **secret crush**

Jim figured it was a prank. It had to be. He was the lame new kid who showed up halfway through the fall semester, dragging so much family drama behind him that everyone could tell right away that he had baggage, even if they never bothered to  _ talk _ to him about it. 

He had baggage, and sometimes he had bruises, and he was allergic to nearly every major allergen in the world and even some minor ones, and he was so damn nearsighted he spent half the school day wearing thick-rimmed glasses and the other half squinting when he took them off after class. This sometimes caused him to trip in the hallways. Depending on the hallway, it also led to him being laughed at. Usually by members of the football team. 

Basically he was a mess. He didn’t really have friends, except for the Russian exchange student who was two years under him, and the two of them only stayed friends out of desperation, because they never seemed to have a clue what the other one was saying. 

So it had to be a prank when he started getting the notes. He didn’t know who it was that could be doing it, only that every so often he’d get back to the locker rooms in the morning after cross country practice and a piece of folded up graph paper would fall out of his locker. 

The first note just said:

_ Hi there. _

Jim was positive it was a prank. Even though, deep down, he didn’t want it to be. And what was the harm in keeping the notes, anyway?

He actually started to look forward to them, and was disappointed when he’d open his locker after practice and wouldn’t find anything except his backpack and his duffel bag. On average he got one note a week, usually on Mondays. He kept all of them.

_ I’m sorry the guys laugh at you. They’re assholes sometimes. But teenagers are assholes, what can you do? _

_ At least you can outrun them. I heard about the last XC meet. Why didn’t you tell anybody you got second place? _

_ I don’t think your glasses are lame, btw. They make your eyes big. But not in a bad way. _

_ I hope you don’t hate it here. I grew up my whole life in this town so I have no idea what it’s like to move somewhere, especially halfway through high school. I hope it doesn’t suck. _

_ I saw Mitchell getting rough with you yesterday after school. He’s a dick, but do you wanna know a secret? He got a 39 on his last Chemistry test. I bet you got a 100, didn’t you. Do you need me to beat him up for you? _

It got to the point where Jim wasn’t just excited to get to his locker after practice to find the notes, but he felt his face heat up every time he read them. 

He couldn’t decide if he wanted to know more about where they came from or not. If he investigated, it was pretty likely he’d find out that it  _ was _ a prank after all, that whoever wrote them was waiting for Jim to find them and show up with his big sensitive heart on his sleeve so they could destroy it. And maybe laugh about it. And tell the whole school until  _ everyone _ was laughing about it. 

“Do you have depression?” Pavel asked over lunch. After Jim had just speculated all of this out loud. They were sitting in their usual table outside, between the portables, even though it was getting colder now and almost nobody sat outside for lunch anymore. 

In fact, that kind of made it better. Jim just wrapped his jacket tighter around himself and took another bite of his sandwich. 

“What makes you think that,” he asked. 

“You sound very negative and very scared of everything.”

“Alright, mister psychology, who do  _ you  _ think is leaving notes in my locker every week?”

“A secret lover, obviously,” Pavel deadpanned--although half the time he said something in that tone of voice Jim couldn’t figure out how to interpret it. 

He left it at that. 

-

The next note didn’t show up for two weeks. 

Jim really needed it this time, after his calculus teacher happily announced to the whole class that Jim was the only student making an A, which ended with Jim getting pushed around enough in the parking lot after school that he had nastier bruises than Frank had ever left him with. One of them was on his face, so now he was being stared at. He couldn’t sleep at all the night before his next cross country meet and ended up vomiting halfway through the race and then nearly passing out at the finish line. In tenth place. The coach yelled at him during the ride back to school and then he sat in class the rest of the day feeling like death and wanting to shrink himself into nonexistence. 

And then he cleared out his locker at the end of the day and there was another note, even though before this, they only ever came in the morning. It said:

_ I’m sorry you had a bad day and I’m sorry I haven't written any notes lately. I feel almost like I jinxed you. Are you okay?  _

The note made Jim’s bad mood a thousand times worse. He didn’t know who was sending them, but he had a guess by now, maybe unconsciously. Because it had to be someone who was going in and out of the sports locker rooms in the mornings, which meant it was someone who practiced in the morning. At this point in the year, that could only point to a member of the cross country team or the football team. 

If it was the cross country team he would have caught whoever it was by now. 

If it was someone from the football team, he was being pranked. Even if the notes were nice sometimes. 

So he balled the note up and threw it in the trash can so hard he nearly pulled a muscle in his arm. 

-

The next monday he showed up before practice, changed into his running clothes, and taped a piece of paper to his locker that said  _ LEAVE ME ALONE _ .

He figured it would work, nip the joke right in the bud and show he wasn’t some sensitive outcast who was going to fall for that shit. 

It didn’t work, but it did have the direct consequence of half of the team coming in after football practice got out, just as Jim was finishing getting changed into his school clothes. Mitchell leaned against the locker next to his and Jim could smell him already. 

“Saw your little note,” he said, grinning so wide like this was all  _ so _ funny, “I didn’t get it, though, because honestly, we’ve barely been giving you any attention at all.”

“We don’t even think about you,” someone said from behind them, and suddenly Jim was acutely aware that there was a small crowd growing around him. He panicked. His mind went completely blank. 

He barely registered anything that was said next. All he could remember was the sound of laughter and the feeling of his bare feet as he ran out of the locker room and down the halls, up the stairs and past empty, unlit classrooms. His instincts brought him to his calculus room, his first class of the day, even though it wouldn’t start for another hour and a half. 

Jim slid down the wall, his hair still wet, his shoes forgotten in the locker room, dropped his backpack on the floor next to him, curled his knees up to his chest and tried to disappear. 

He’d thought hours had passed like that, but the next time he looked up turned out to be less than 30 minutes later, when he heard footsteps in the hallway. He hoped it was his calculus teacher, who could at least let him in, and hopefully not ask questions. 

Instead, he looked up and his blood went cold. It was one of the football players--Leonard, he was pretty sure, but everyone called him Leo--looking remorseful and holding Jim’s converse in his hand. 

Jim waited for everyone else to show up, for the big punchline, for Leonard to laugh at him. 

“You forgot your shoes,” was all he said, and Jim realized he’d heard him speak before, in chemistry, seen him raising his hand out of the corner of his eye and getting the answer right every time. So he was a jock  _ and _ a nerd. Probably he’d been voted homecoming king, too, except Jim didn’t bother going to homecoming. But he was tall and handsome and his skin was clear and his shoulders were broad and muscular, unlike most of the other lanky, acne-prone teenage boys (Jim) some of which had to wear glasses (Jim). He probably shaved every day, too. 

Jim realized he was mad at him. Because he was perfect, but also for this bullshit gesture of  _ bringing him his shoes _ , as if Jim had just  _ forgotten _ them in the locker room as opposed to leaving them behind because he was being tormented by the football team. The football team which Leonard was on. If Jim hadn’t repressed it already, he probably could remember seeing Leonard’s face in that crowd of sweaty, laughing football players. 

Still, he reached his hand out to take them, and hastily pulled them on even though he didn’t have socks. He expected Leonard to be gone when he looked up; he wasn’t. 

He was still standing there looking completely awkward, like he didn’t know what to say, like Jim was somehow an even more popular, smart, attractive football player and not a total loser. 

Or maybe he was acting awkward because he was stalling while the rest of the team caught up so they could put that bruise back on his cheekbone now that it’d finally healed. 

“What,” Jim snapped. 

“I’m sorry. What happened in there--it was--I shouldn’t have--”

Jim let out a bark of laughter which sounded more pathetic than anything else. 

“Oh fuck you. Yeah, go ahead and apologize now that nobody’s around. I’ll remember you said that next time you’re making fun of me in front of everyone.”

“I don’t--”

“Go away,” Jim said, crossing his arms over his knees and staring at the ground. He waited until he finally heard Leonard’s footsteps go quiet and disappear down the hall, and then he waited even longer--not moving from the floor, even when the lights turned on and the hallways became noisy--until the bell finally rang. 

-

The notes still came, but a lot less frequently. Maybe once or twice a month. They became less personal and more generic, although the first one said:

_ I’m sorry. I guess you think that writing notes means I’m embarrassed to talk to you, but I’m not. It’s just that I never know what to say. I don’t want to say the wrong thing and make you think I’m just like everybody else. _

Jim threw that one away, too.

-

Leonard started saying hi to him in the hallways, in chemistry class, even when Jim would only glare back in response. Jim realized too late that Leonard wasn’t in the locker room that morning, when he actually tried to remember the faces of everyone who _ was _ . But at that point he couldn’t apologize for how mean he’d been when Leonard came to give him his shoes. 

He tried not to think about it. Or Leonard. 

-

_ Happy Monday. _

Jim kept that one.

_ Have a good Thanksgiving break. _

_ Merry Christmas. If you celebrate it. Shit, I shouldn’t assume. Happy holidays? _

That one actually made Jim smile. 

-

The school year started again in January and cross country practice changed to track practice and the football team--thank god--was in offseason, and they all did weight training in the afternoon instead. Jim’s mornings got better on their own, without needing a note in his locker. Pavel’s English became more intelligible. They both joined the robotics team, and ended up meeting a handful of people who actually bothered to remember their names. 

He didn’t realize he’d forgotten about the notes until he got another one at the end of the month and felt his heart skip a beat at the sight of that little folded up piece of paper. 

_ I don’t know how much longer I can keep writing these. I feel like you’re going to catch me. Although maybe I want you to? I want to talk to you in person. I see you laughing with your friends and I wish I could be part of the conversation. I wish I hadn’t fucked everything up last semester. Maybe I shouldn’t have started leaving these notes in the first place.  _

It actually made Jim’s heart hurt a little bit. If it was someone from the football team, he could understand if whoever it was had maybe tried to be friends at some point and everything got fucked up. Jim’s life tended to work like that. 

This time he wrote a note back, folded it up and left it in the crack between his locker door as inconspicuous as possible, unlike the last time he tried to write a response. He wrote:

_ You can keep leaving notes. I like them. I’m sorry I got mad. I want to talk to you too, you know. Whoever you are.  _

It worked. A note fell out of his locker the next morning. It became a pattern, then, and Jim and his locker-room pen pal left daily notes for each other. It was a little bit ridiculous, considering the existence of cell phones and the internet and the concept of face-to-face interaction, but Jim didn’t care. And nobody had to know. And it made him smile, again, every time he found another note. 

_ I came to school early this morning to help our chem teacher with tutoring some of the freshmen, and I saw you running hurdles at track practice. How are you good at all of this shit?? I feel like when I run it looks like I’m at war with my own body. I know you said you were sorry you never came to any football games, but don’t be. You did yourself a favor. _

_ That sounds cool. I would join the robotics team but I’m kind of a technophobe. I don’t wanna think about the fact that we can program robots to do things. We’re all getting replaced. By the time I make it out of med school they’ll probably have all robot doctors in the hospital and then what the hell am I gonna do? _

_ Valentine’s day is in like a week, now. I don’t have a girlfriend. The other guys on the team said I should just send some girl a rose and ask her out ON Valentine’s day, and see if I get lucky, but I told them that’s bullshit. I don’t want to treat dating like there are cheat codes or some shit. It’s not just about getting laid, is it? Am I the last person in this generation who thinks that? _

_ There we go. At least we’re not alone. And no, I don’t even have a girl I’ve really been talking to, not like that. Just some friends who are girls. I mean the person I’ve been talking to the most is probably you, anyway, but I don’t think you want me to send you a rose. I don’t know if you’d like it. _

Jim didn’t leave a response to that one for three days, until Valentine’s day was _ tomorrow _ , and the cafeteria had had those tables set up for a week, now, where you could order roses for people. Jim realized that even though he had no idea where this note-writing thing was even  _ going _ , there was a window for it to go  _ somewhere, _ and it was about to close. 

He wrote:

_ You could send me one. If you want. I would like it. But aren’t you worried you’ll get made fun of?  _

There was no note in Jim’s locker the next morning, and Jim figured he’d missed his window, because it was Valentine’s day. 

It was Valentine’s day and all of a sudden there were couples in the hallway that had never existed before, and every class was getting interrupted by rose deliveries. During lunch Jim coached Pavel in sending one to a girl on the robotics team, Janice, and nearly had to write it himself with how flustered Pavel was getting just  _ standing _ in line to order it. 

He had the idea, briefly, to send a rose to his pen pal, until he remembered that he didn’t actually know who his pen pal was. 

Well, he had an idea, but it seemed too good to be true. 

And then he was sitting in chemistry, the final class of the day, and one of the student council members came in carrying the last of the rose deliveries. Jim had gotten a little bit more disappointed in every class so far, when the deliveries came and went without any of the roses being for him, but he still felt a little glimmer of hope as she called out names and wove around desks to hand people their roses. 

When she said  _ Jim Kirk _ he felt his entire face go red. 

His hands were shaking as he read the note attached to the rose, in that familiar handwriting:

_ To Jim, _

_ I don’t care if I get made fun of.  _

_ Love, Leonard _

He turned over his shoulder, to the desk two rows back and one row over where Leonard always sat. Leonard was blushing too, but he smiled when he caught Jim’s eye, and for the first time since he came to this school, when someone looked at him, Jim didn’t want to disappear. 


	11. mckirk / whimpering or sobbing / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just for context it's post ST:ID. or i guess during? right after that scene when Jim wakes up in the hospital

day 11: **whimpering or sobbing**

The words  _ you were barely dead  _ had given Jim false hope that he was going to be able to walk out of that hospital room as soon as Bones finished filling out the final report on his blood transfusion. Because he needed to get out. Everything was weird and different and he could tell as soon as he’d opened his eyes. But Bones made it pretty clear that if he so much as let one single toe hang off of his hospital bed he would be hypo’d unconscious. So he decided to wait for Bones to finish up and hope the next doctor was nicer. 

He just laid there, the rest of the morning, and watched Bones while he worked, smoothing the hospital bed sheets under his fingertips and trying to figure out just what it was that felt different since he’d woken up. 

The other person’s blood in his veins, maybe, but that didn’t really make sense. Maybe it was leftover radiation getting cycled out of his system. 

It had to be, because he waited all day for someone to give him a change of clothes and tell him he could leave, and nobody did. Even Bones left, eventually, long after he’d finished doing any actual work. He stayed behind until Jim was too tired to keep his eyes open, sitting in the visitor’s chair next to his bed and talking and joking and intimidating the nurse into bringing Jim extra food. 

Jim knew, somewhere in his brain, that Bones was just visiting, and that he’d be back, but he still panicked when it finally came time for him to leave. He instinctively reached out his hand as if he was going to try and pull Bones back and keep him there next to his bed, maybe for the whole night, maybe forever. 

It took a few hours of tossing and turning in bed before he realized that  _ this _ was the thing which felt different. It had nothing to do with his blood transfusion and everything to do with the doctor who’d performed it. 

The little spike of panic in his stomach from that realization, thankfully, wasn’t strong enough to keep him from falling asleep soon after. 

He felt like he went comatose again, like he’d slept for days, but the next time he drifted awake and opened his eyes, it was still dark. He looked to the side. It had only been about three hours. 

“Why am I awake,” he mumbled to himself, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes to block out the cool blue lights of the hospital machines around his bed. If he had an extra set of hands he’d cover his ears to block out the steady beeping, too, of the one that tracked his heartbeat. 

He never understood those machines that play the rhythm of your heartbeat back to you. He always felt like they were raising his anxiety, and wasn’t that the opposite of what they were intended to do?

“You were just in a coma, your body’s tired of sleeping.”

“Tired of sleeping,” Jim repeated, and he’d had some sort of joke ready to say about that until he realized that someone was in his room. Bones. Bones was in his room. He dropped his hands from his face and tried to blink enough times for the world to become clear again. 

“What are you doing here?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Bones replied. He had that rough, middle-of-the-night voice. It reminded Jim of their years at the Academy. 

“Come here. I can’t see.”

“That’s because you were just abusing your eye sockets,” Bones said quietly, and Jim could sense him approaching, could hear his footsteps. He expected Bones to fall heavily into the chair next to his bed and nearly jumped when he felt the mattress shift. 

It was dark, and Jim’s vision was still a little blurry, but he could see, now, that Bones was sitting at the edge of his bed, next to his hip. It was closer than he expected and still not close enough. His hands urged to reach for him again. 

“Hi,” Jim said instead, swallowing down a lump in his throat that popped up out of the blue, as soon as he denied himself the want to touch Bones, to pull him closer. This was already close. He needed to be okay with that. Bones had seen him dead, after all. Jim was surprised he could even handle being in the same room as him right now. 

“Hi.”

Bones was quiet. As Jim’s eyes focused in the dim light he could see the lines of worry in his face, the darkness under his eyes. He wondered if he was imagining that it looked like Bones had been crying, the way those blue lights reflected a little bit extra off of his eyes like there were still tears there. 

It was such a stark contrast to earlier that day, to the Bones who had been sitting in the visitor chair with his feet propped up on Jim’s bed, complaining about hospital coffee and downplaying everything that had just happened with jokes and sarcasm and sideways smiles. Jim wanted that Bones back, the Bones that acted so well like nothing was wrong, like nothing had happened, comforting Jim without having to say anything outright. It was all an act, he realized. 

Jim didn’t know how bad he looked, simultaneously under and over-slept, wired and shaking a little bit from the realization that he’d died and the realization that he was in love with his best friend--but he was pretty sure Bones looked worse. 

“What’s wrong?” he tried to ask, and his heart broke as soon as they made eye contact. As soon as he saw that Bones had definitely been crying, that he  _ definitely _ hadn’t slept--for much longer than just one night--and Bones let out a long, shaky exhale before dropping his head into his hand. 

Jim didn’t know what to do. It was terrifying, because he knew what all of it meant. He knew what the shaking of Bones’ shoulders meant and the uneven pattern of his breath and he knew, worst of all, the entire reason Bones was breaking down in the first place. And he didn’t know what to do. 

His instincts took over; the same ones which had been tugging at his arms all day. His hands found Bones’ shoulders, the curve of his back as he cried, quietly, into the palm of his hand, and scrambled for some sort of grip to pull Bones to lie down next to him. His arms wrapped around his back and he tucked Bones’ head into the curve of his neck and it was like a switch was flipped. 

All of a sudden everything felt right, and everything made sense, and all of a sudden Bones broke down completely into heavy, painful sobs. 

His whole body shook and Jim just held tighter. 

“It’s going to be okay,” Jim heard himself saying, to the sound of Bones muffling his cries into Jim’s neck. He could tell Bones was trying to stop, but it was a losing battle. All of this had been building ever since his death, and Bones probably hadn’t stopped to take a breath between the moment Jim died and the moment he woke up this morning. Jim slid his hand up and down Bones’ back, not to try and stop him from shaking and sobbing but more just to remind him that he was there. 

“I’m here,” he whispered into Bones’ hair, not even sure if Bones could hear it. “I’m okay. You’re okay. I love you.”

Bones choked, breathing hard against Jim’s neck as the cries shook through his whole body, but he held tighter to Jim, too, hands curling into his thin hospital gown, and Jim knew what that meant. What it all meant. Somehow, he felt less afraid. 

“I love you,” he repeated, “I love you. I love you. I love you.”


	12. mckirk / pillow biting / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the late posts today and yesterday yall. encouragement is appreciated because i think i've hit a wall and we're only 1/3 of the way through.   
still, enjoy some very thoughtful and reflective smut

day 12: **pillow biting**

Leonard pretty much knew what Jim was going to be like during sex long before they ended up in bed together. 

He knew things were going to start off fast and hard and reckless, knew Jim would jump headfirst like he always did, and he was right about that. From their first, messy kiss in the alley outside of the bar, when they’d realized that neither of them had really cared about the  _ drinks _ part of  _ getting drinks _ tonight, Jim was all in. All lips and teeth and tongue and hands finding their way underneath Leonard’s clothes and guiding them to the closest possible surface to push Leonard up against. It was a wonder they even managed to wait until they made it to the dorm. By all accounts Jim kissed him in that alleyway like it was his last chance for an orgasm, like they were both going to die as soon as they walked out into the street. 

And then the door to Leonard’s room closed behind him and Jim’s entire demeanor changed. Leonard had been expecting that too. Jim was wild and impulsive and he did everything too fast, but all he needed was time. Time to get settled, time to find a place for himself, time to find someone who could be patient through it all. 

Leonard liked to think that he was that someone. When Jim’s outer shell had finally broken, that devil-may-care attitude which was carefully and meticulously projected to the outside world, he could be someone so quiet, and thoughtful, and raw. 

The first time Leonard had seen this part of him, a couple months into the Academy when Jim broke down one night after an exam--not because he’d failed it, but because he made a perfect score and realized he didn’t even feel good when he’d found out--that was probably the night that Leonard started falling for him. 

Tonight was something similar. In the alley behind the bar, where Leonard could still taste the sweet traces of rum on Jim’s tongue and feel the harsh, excited rhythm of his heartbeat through the fabric of his t shirt, it was hard not to think that this could just be another one of Jim’s impulsive decisions--that  _ Leonard _ could be just an impulsive decision for Jim--but then he took his time, he followed Leonard back to campus, hands crammed into his pockets and shoulder brushing against Leonard’s, and they made it back to a place where they were alone, safe inside the familiar walls of the dorm, and Leonard got the person he wanted to see. The real Jim. No performances. No jokes or arrogant smiles pasted on his face to hide who he was underneath. 

In fact, Jim was quiet as he closed the distance between them, kissing him again before Leonard had the chance to turn up the lights. It was more gentle this time, but no less urgent, no less seeking, and all of the doubt was gone from Leonard’s mind. He knew that Jim wanted this, wanted him. 

Except Jim was almost too quiet. That was the only part that didn’t make sense. Because Jim made love exactly how Leonard expected, exactly how Leonard had imagined over the past few months. He was eager and attentive and pulled at Leonard like he was never close enough, asked for more like he didn’t think he was allowed, but still smiled underneath him when Leonard said something like  _ you’re unbelievable, _ and laughed so easily when they bumped foreheads or knocked knees. All of that was right, and perfect, and everything Leonard wanted. 

For some reason, though, he’d thought Jim would be louder. 

He was draped across Jim’s back, now, his lips brushing against the warmth of his skin, feeling the slide of their bodies as he thrust into him. He could feel Jim’s body tensing, pushing back to meet every thrust, could hear his hands sliding against the sheets, but he couldn’t hear anything else. Only short, strangled breaths, muffled into the pillows. 

At first it didn’t make sense, but then Leonard remembered how hard it could be sometimes for Jim to speak his mind, to tell the truth about himself even when it hurt him more to just let people make their own assumptions. Afraid to lose control, maybe. Or afraid to hear what came out of his mouth when he did.

Leonard nosed along the line of Jim’s back, to the curve of his neck, and pressed his lips there. He felt a shiver run up Jim’s spine and stilled for a moment,  _ felt _ more than heard Jim sigh on his next exhale. 

“I know that pillow’s in your mouth,” Leonard said quietly, kissing his neck again. “I want to hear you. I want to hear everything.”

Jim obeyed faster than he’d thought he would, and whined in the back of his throat before Leonard even started to move again. That was only the beginning. 

It turned out Leonard’s expectations were  _ all _ correct. Jim was  _ very _ loud in bed. 


	13. mckirk / breaking the rules / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so this is a continuation of the story from day 8: dancing, because i couldn't stop myself. i'll probably do at least one more to finish up the story since i'm getting a little sadistic with all this pining (sorry in advance)

day 13: **breaking the rules**

It wasn’t even close to the first time Leonard had been in Jim’s quarter’s--or the first time he’d been in Jim’s quarters and thought about doing this. Usually he kept his mind under control, at least when he was _ with _ Jim, but sometimes he couldn’t stop himself from thinking about it, from seeing Jim sprawled out on the other side of the couch in his slacks and his undershirt, mumbling about how much he needed a night off, and imagining what would come next in a perfect world. Closing that distance between them on the couch, settling on top of Jim, between his legs, sliding the tight black undershirt up his chest, kissing him--

It was one thing to imagine having sex with your best friend--Leonard could always blame that on hormones and dry spells and being in space with the same damn people all the time--but when he caught himself fantasizing about just _ kissing, _ it never failed to make him feel like a lovesick dumbass. 

Although he definitely exceeded his known limits of dumbassery once he decided to go along with this. To let Jim lead him out of that dance hall into the cool night air, back to the ship, and then, when he _ should _have called it a night and headed back to his own quarters, to let Jim look at him with those big eyes and that shy, private smile and lead him into his quarters, too. 

This was a bad idea. This was a really, _ really _ bad idea, because Leonard was in love with his best friend, and he would do anything for him, _ anything _, even this, even when he knew that for Jim it probably meant nothing, and for Leonard it would mean everything. 

He blamed it on those cocktails and the adrenaline left in his veins from dancing with Jim in the middle of the crowded dance floor and kissing him in the bar, and in the street outside of the bar, and in the turbolift on the way to Jim’s quarters. He blamed it on the way his breath caught in his throat when he saw Jim tug his shirt off, even though he’d seen the same thing hundreds of times, but Jim had never done it _ for _ him before--he figured that was why he didn’t put a stop to anything. Because he could definitely live with himself in the morning if he hooked up with Jim out of tipsy stupidity, and not out of the pathetic hope that this was somehow going to make Jim love him back. 

Jim took his hand and led him to the bed, not the couch, and he tried not to let it mean anything in his head. 

He wiggled out of his jeans, down to his Starfleet-issued boxer briefs which Leonard had to remind himself he had seen before, too, had to remind himself that this wasn’t a big deal. 

He fell backwards into bed, pulling Leonard on top of him and laughing loose and easy when they landed. Leonard couldn’t stop himself from smiling down at Jim, couldn’t stop the way his chest tightened at the sight of Jim laughing underneath him, the way he always hoped. He never wanted Jim to be serious with him. Never wanted Jim to be anyone other than himself.

He cleared his throat before he said something stupid. 

“You’ve actually read the Starfleet regs start to finish?” he asked. 

Jim squinted up at him, looking like this was the last thing he expected Leonard to ask about and also like he might start laughing over it again. 

“Maybe.”

Leonard raised an eyebrow. 

“Okay, I’ve read the ones on fraternization, at least. And what we’re doing is totally in a grey area. So basically it’s fine. So like, you can take your clothes off now, if you want.”

Oh yeah, Leonard still hadn’t taken anything off, even his shoes. He toed those off easily, and then sat up to get his jacket and shirt off except for some reason his instincts waited to kick in until that exact moment and he paused, jacket halfway off his shoulders. 

This was a bad idea. 

And then Jim’s hands were sliding up his thighs, over his pants, more gentle and soothing than suggestive, and Leonard remembered what was happening, remembered that he was straddling his best friend right now as a prelude to hooking up with him. Or maybe the hookup had already started, technically. It should have only increased his fight-or-flight response. Instead it made him hard. 

Jim’s voice didn’t help. “Relax, Bones, I’m not going to kick you off the ship for having sex with the Captain. If anything, you might be entitled to certain benefits.”

Leonard snorted. 

“You are _ exactly _ the reason Starfleet has regulations against fraternizing.”

“I’m going to take that as a compliment.” Jim smiled, pushed himself up the bed so he could sit up again and help Leonard out of his jacket, and then pull his shirt over his head. He was basically doing all of the work, because Leonard could only have that thought, again, about how much he wanted to give Jim a _ real _ compliment. He wanted to tell Jim how perfect he looked like this, still flushed from dancing, hair a little messy from running his fingers through it, lips red and swollen from all the kissing that Leonard couldn’t really regret, not anymore, not when his shirt was off and Jim pulled him forward with a hand around the back of his neck and brought their mouths together again. 

Jim wasn’t what he expected, or maybe he was. The majority of rumors that spread around about him always painted him as some sort of dynamite lay, like the kind of hookup that becomes a point of comparison for all other hookups, although Leonard never really believed that. Not when he knew what Jim was like in private, after hours, relaxing in his quarters, easy and real and imperfect. 

That was how he kissed Leonard, now, and Leonard still felt like he was better than anyone who came before him. Even when he missed Leonard’s mouth because he was trying to kiss him and negotiate his pants off at the same time, when he laughed afterwards and kissed him again, on his cheek, his nose, his cupid’s bow, and rolled them over in bed. Their legs tangled and their foreheads bonked together and Jim accidentally bit Leonard’s bottom lip a little too hard once but it was perfect, and Jim was perfect, and this was a terrible, awful idea and also maybe the best night of Leonard’s life. 

It was all too new and exciting to last long. This had been building since they were sitting at the bar down on Vega, and even longer for Leonard, as much as he wished he could take his time. He wished he could give Jim everything, spread him out on the bed and kiss every inch of his beautiful skin, kiss every scar from before he met Leonard and learned how to ask for help. He wanted to find the places of his body that made Jim shiver and moan and beg for more. 

God, he wanted to hear Jim beg, wanted to have his fingers inside him and hear Jim ask for it in that same low, breathless voice like the first time he said _ kiss me _ . But neither of them were going to make it that far, judging by the strangled moans coming out of Jim as soon as Leonard got a hand around his cock. A blush traveled up his neck to his cheeks and the tips of his ears and Leonard couldn’t resist following that trail with his mouth while Jim writhed underneath him. He felt like his head was spinning just from the sound, from the thought that Jim was moaning for _ him _ , _ because _ of him. 

And Leonard tried not to think about the fact that this could be a one-time thing, tried not to let that ruin it. He tried not to imagine that come tomorrow they were going to pretend like it never happened, go back to normal, and he was going to have to sit in Jim’s quarters in the evenings like they always did and see Jim’s bedroom out of the corner of his eye and have to pretend they didn’t have sex in here. He’d have to pretend he didn’t know what Jim sounded like, didn’t know the way he flushed all the way to his stomach right before he came, the way he looked right into Leonard’s eyes as long as he could, before his orgasm finally crashed through him and he screwed his eyes shut and pressed his head back against the pillows. Leonard tried not to think about the fact that they might never do this again. 

And then it was over, and he was sitting on the edge of the bed staring at the wall and listening as Jim’s breaths started to even out again. If he looked at Jim right now, sleepy and flushed and sprawled out in bed, if he laid down next to him and looked into his eyes one more time, this would all be over. Whatever the hell this was. He wouldn’t be able to stop his mouth from forming around the words he’d worked so carefully to keep inside. And Jim would get stiff and awkward and have to explain to him that this was just a hookup, that he didn’t mean it that way, that maybe they should put some distance between each other for a little bit so things won’t get weird. 

Leonard looked down at his hands. They were shaking. 

“You can sleep here if you want, you know,” he heard Jim say from behind him, and there it was already. His voice was strained and awkward and almost rehearsed, like he was only offering out of obligation. 

Leonard was so fucking stupid. He may as well have ripped his heart out of his chest on that dance floor and given it right to Jim and it would have hurt less than this. 

“No, no, it’s fine,” he muttered, trying to sound casual, trying to _ look _ casual as he stood up and collected his clothes. He hastily pulled them on and made for the door. At this point he was basically running away from Jim before he did something even _ more _ stupid, like look back. 

Except--

“See you tomorrow?” Jim asked, voice careful and unsure as if the answer wasn’t an obvious _ yes _ , _ of course _ they were going to see each other tomorrow. 

Leonard turned to look over his shoulder, and Jim looked exactly as he expected, lazy and satisfied and curled up on top of the covers. He stared back at Leonard with that question hanging between them, but all Leonard could think about was how much he wished he could tear his clothes off again and fall into bed next to him, pull Jim into his chest and tell him how much this meant, how long he’d been waiting for this, how perfect Jim was. 

Instead he just nodded, swallowed around the lump in his throat. 

“Course,” he said. “See you tomorrow.”


	14. mckirk / three times a bridesmaid / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> to be honest i don't really know what this prompt means. but this is what i'm doing with it. also this was so fun to write. enjoy another installment of sexy bastard bones

day 14: **three times a bridesmaid**

“You’ve been someone’s Best Man  _ how _ many times?”

“Eight,” he said, knocking back the rest of his drink. The bartender was either eavesdropping or a friend of his because she refilled it without hesitation. Bourbon, neat. “Four of those were in the last year.”

“Holy shit,” Jim breathed, and laughed before he thought better of it. He didn’t know if this was maybe a sensitive topic. It could be, if the guy was single. 

Also, apparently he’d had way too much to drink and that next thought came right out of his mouth. 

“Are you single?”

Mr. Best Man looked entirely shocked for a second, eyes wide, frozen in place just as he was about to reach for his glass again, and Jim was sure he’d offended him, right up to the second when he started laughing, loose and deep and surprisingly sexy. 

Okay,  _ unsurprisingly _ sexy. The only reason Jim had elbowed in next to him at the bar was because he’d seen him at the altar during the ceremony and thought he was gorgeous, and then witnessed his charming and funny and tear-jerking Best Man speech and thought he was the whole package, complete with a southern accent, and then saw him alone at the bar and hoped to  _ god _ he was also single. 

“Do you even know my name?” he asked, propping himself up against the bar with one elbow and actually leaning  _ closer _ to Jim, like he saw right through him and for some reason still decided Jim was worth flirting with. 

Jim’s brain honestly broke. 

He was tall and tan and his suit covered every inch of his body but Jim could still see the width of his shoulders and the strength in his arms, and he had this brown hair that wasn’t even styled but still fell so perfectly across his forehead. And he had just asked Jim a question. And he was looking at him expectantly with his dark eyes and the sly, knowing curve of his mouth. 

“You don’t, do you.”

“Bernard?” Jim tried. He knew it was something vaguely dorky. He also knew that if he fucked this up he might have to say goodbye to the hottest man he’d ever met. 

Decidedly-Not-Bernard laughed again, for a good thirty seconds, moved to take another sip of his bourbon and had to pause just to laugh right before the glass reached his lips. 

“I got it wrong.”

Jim watched the muscles in his throat as he swallowed and felt like he had to run back into the church and go to confession. 

“You did,” he said. “Although it might as well be Bernard. It’s Leonard.”

“Oh,” Jim said, because he’d already thought he fucked it up multiple times by now and still Leonard hadn’t left, hadn’t stopped leaning so close to Jim while they talked. “Well that’s not nearly as bad.”

Leonard cringed a little bit. Exhaling through his teeth. 

“That’s not a compliment.” He took another, smaller sip, keeping eye contact with Jim over the glass, and then turned to set it down and said to the bar, “And here I thought you were tryin to seduce me.”

“Was it that obvious?”

“Oh yeah.”

“I can be more obvious.”

Leonard’s eyes flicked back to him at that, and god, Jim wondered if he knew what kind of an effect that sideways glance  _ had _ on people. It made his suit feel too tight and his head spin and he needed to stop drinking, right now, or he wouldn’t be able to stand up for much longer. 

“Go ahead,” Leonard said, voice low. He knew  _ exactly _ what he was doing, didn’t he. 

Jim knew this part, too, though. Maybe he couldn’t exude sexiness like Leonard, who looked so natural and comfortable in a suit that it was no wonder this was his eighth time as a Best Man. But Jim was no stranger to cheesy pick up lines. 

Although he had a suspicion that they only really worked because people found him cute enough to hook up with him  _ despite  _ the pick up line he’d used, not because of it. 

Still, he was ready for this. 

“You could make me the third happiest person here, after the bride and the groom.”

That one had definitely worked for him before. 

Leonard turned back to face him while he considered it, squinting at Jim a little bit. 

“Nope. Try again.”

Fuck. 

“That suit looks really good on you. Although it might look even better on my floor.”

Kind of overused, although Leonard snorted and shook his head before he took another sip. 

“Try again.”

“I know you’re the Best Man at this wedding, but why don’t I show you what  _ I’m _ best at?”

Leonard blinked at him for a few seconds, while Jim couldn’t resist grinning at his own ridiculous collection of pick up lines. And then he dragged a hand down his face, clearly hiding a smile of his own. 

“God, that one was bad.”

They both started laughing. Jim wondered how the hell he hadn’t scared Leonard away yet. 

“I know, I’m sorry,” he said, catching his breath, “I can’t think of any good pick up lines. Can you?”

It took Leonard almost a full minute to get that one. He was staring into his bourbon, maybe contemplating finishing it off and also probably wondering what the hell Jim was going on about, and then his thoughtful expression broke and he just whispered,

“ _ God damn it _ ,”

and a blush crept up his neck to the sides of his cheeks. Jim had never felt so pleased with himself in his life. Also, Leonard was already a handsome bastard, but Leonard  _ blushing? _ Holy shit. 

“Did I get it?” Jim asked, and Leonard only flushed a little darker, shook his head like he couldn’t believe what he was about to do. Then he finished off the last of his drink, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, looked up at Jim through his lashes, and said, 

“Come home with me.”


	15. mckirk / anyonymous hookup / E

day 15: **anonymous hookup**

“So how’d  _ you _ end up on this sad excuse of a starbase?”

“Nope,” Jim said, mostly to himself, because the urge to tell his life story to this very attractive man at the bar was weirdly tempting. He seemed like a good listener. And from what Jim had learned from their conversation leading up to this moment, which started with  _ drinking alone? _ and then consisted of nothing but complaining about space, starbases, this bar, and the drinks at this bar, he probably would have some funny things to say about Jim’s life story, too. But still, “No personal information.”

The guy looked like he wanted to laugh. He raised an eyebrow and lifted his drink to his lips. 

“And why not?” he asked. He took a slow sip while Jim answered, glancing at him out of the corner of his eye. 

“Because it’s probably going to complicate things. I don’t want this to be complicated.”

“Fair enough.” His voice was rough like the liquor had burned a little bit at the end there. Rough and pretty goddamn sexy. Although the first thing that had drawn Jim to this man was his look, the way it shot through Jim’s entire body when they caught eyes across the bar--the subtle, almost undetectable smile at the corners of his mouth and his eyes as Jim wove his way through the crowd to stand next to him. And then...other things. The way his jeans sat low on his hips and the way his jacket stretched across his chest, the artful messiness of his hair. The stubble on his cheeks. Maybe Jim had been in space too long, but seeing someone break so many Starfleet uniform regulations was undeniably sexy. 

“I’m guessing no names, then?” he asked next, and Jim nodded. His head already felt heavier from the alcohol. By the time he finished this cocktail he’d be tipsy enough to shake the Captain-voice out of the back of his head but still sober enough to give this guy some mind-blowing sex. 

“Absolutely not.” Jim smiled. 

Without needing to coordinate it, they both knocked back the last of their drinks. 

“You know,” he said, and that rough edge in his voice made Jim feel warm, “I’d say my temporary quarters on this base definitely qualify as  _ impersonal _ .”

Jim studied him for a moment, the dark hunger in his eyes, the challenging, inviting smile on his face, the way he was leaning so close now that Jim could smell his cologne. He managed to turn off that Captain-voice in record time, forgetting that he was on this starbase for a reason, that he should be on-call for the rest of the night even though he’d given the crew a day off since they got here, that tomorrow morning he had to be in the main operations office at 0800 to pick up the new CMO of the Enterprise. All of that could wait. 

“Lead the way.”

-

Jim wasn’t sure if it just meant that his standards were low (especially at this particular point of his Starship-Captain-dry-spell) that he considered it the best sex of his life. 

Either way, the feeling seemed to be somewhat mutual. Considering the sex lasted more than half the night, starting with a makeout-turned blowjob in the doorway of this guy’s (decidedly spartan) quarters. They made it to the bed after that, where Jim happily reciprocated the doorway blowjob he’d just gotten, took in the sight of his lean, tanned body spread out on the bed and felt like he was getting drunk all over again just on the sounds he made while Jim had his cock in his mouth. 

It was a really nice cock, too. Jim almost started to wonder if this was too good to be true, if it could even be possible for him to find such a perfect man on his first night off in months. 

And then he remembered that he knew absolutely nothing about him. 

There could be plenty of red flags, he just didn’t ask any questions other than _ is that good _ ,  _ do you want this _ ,  _ can you touch me here _ ,  _ can you go faster _ . 

But Jim wanted to ask all those other questions, too. He wanted to ask how this guy had ended up on such a weird little starbase, why his suitcase looked big enough to carry his whole life inside of it. He wanted to know how long he’d been here, and how long he was staying, where he was before this and where he would go next. 

Space was making him sentimental, or something. Because questions kept popping into his head even when his date was fucking him into the mattress and he couldn’t breathe without moaning, could barely even form the words to say  _ yes, harder _ , every time that deep voice behind him asked  _ are you still with me? _

He caught himself wondering if it would be weird to ask for this guy’s information in the morning, if it would really be  _ so _ optimistic to think they’d see each other again. He quickly pushed the thought out of his mind, which turned out to be easy as soon as the next thrust found his prostate and pleasure shot up his body like a firework. 

Plus, he had to remember they knew nothing about each other.  _ No personal information. _ Those were his own damn words. 

So what if they collapsed on the bed afterwards, chests heaving and legs and arms tangled together and Jim turned to look at him and they shared such a private sort of smile, like this was anything but their first time? Then there was the fact that neither of them seemed to assume that Jim would leave right away, to the point where this guy didn’t even bother to ask before he turned on the replicator and negotiated some very average-tasting burgers out of it. Jim laughed and poked fun at him when he seemingly covered his entire plate--burger, fries, and all--with ketchup, and he snapped back like the two of them had some long history of banter. Like they hadn’t met just hours before. 

They ended up in a deep conversation about the effects of life in space on the human psyche and Jim almost forgot the fact that he’d come here to have sex, that this was a one time, temporary, anyonymous, forgettable thing happening, that he was sitting naked on the couch with an equally naked stranger. It tugged at his heartstrings a little when he realized that this wasn’t the start of a friendship--that it wasn’t the start of anything, it would just be a single point on the map of Jim’s life--because they talked so easily it could have been their millionth conversation, and they laughed and teased each other and couldn’t even get mad over the things they disagreed on. 

Space was making him sentimental, definitely. 

And then he was clearing the plates from between them on the couch, and Jim remembered what this night had actually been about, probably in the same moment that his eyes landed on this guy’s cock again. So he crawled to the other side of the couch and into his lap and kissed him again, pulling back for a second to feign disgust at the overwhelming taste of ketchup. They both dissolved into laughter and Jim couldn’t stop smiling, even as he was being flipped over against the cool surface of the couch. 

“No, wait,” he said, breathless, regretting it a little bit because he was literally about to get fucked again as he said it and then all contact ceased. “I mean, I wanna turn over. Wanna see you.”

“Oh,” he said. He lifted up off of Jim enough for Jim to wiggle onto his back. 

That was probably the most reckless decision Jim made that night. After all his wistful thinking--after coming home with this guy in the first place, this guy he knew  _ nothing _ about--the stupidest thing he did was lie there looking right into his eyes the next time they both came. 

Because that face was never going to leave his head, after that. That face, and those hands, and his sarcastic comments and dry laughter and the stupid ketchup taste in his mouth. 

Fuck. 

-

Jim yawned. His hangover wasn’t nearly as bad as he’d expected, but then again, he hadn’t really been at that bar last night to get drunk. He only drank for as long as it took to find that guy he went home with. That guy he hadn’t even given a proper goodbye to. 

But he couldn’t bring himself to feel guilty over that. One, they both knew that this was going to be a one-time thing. A nameless, one-time thing. And two, he’d clearly had somewhere to go as well, the way they both catapulted out of bed as soon as they saw the time. Jim pulled his clothes on so fast that he’d forgotten underwear--which he realized once he was back in his quarters on the ship changing into full uniform. He was pretty sure he’d said some _ sort  _ of goodbye, even if it was just one word thrown over his shoulder. He hoped he’d given at least that much, after what could very well have been the best hookup he’d ever had. 

He needed to just stop worrying about it. Being Captain had changed something about his empathy, apparently. He couldn’t remember ever being so concerned about hurting someone’s feelings after a one-night stand. 

“Are you unwell, Jim?” Spock asked. They were waiting for the starbase manager to track down the transfer records from their database. And their new CMO--whoever they were--was apparently late. 

“No, no, I’m fine,” Jim said, waving his hand dismissively. “A little hungover,” he added quietly. 

Spock nodded in understanding, even though he’d probably spent his night off on the ship making spreadsheets or something. Jim coughed to cover up a laugh and straightened his posture. 

“Those records must really be buried, huh?” Jim asked, raising his voice. 

“Something like that,” the manager said. She laughed awkwardly, trying to tap through their files as fast as possible. Since Jim’s new CMO was late by ten minutes already he hoped this person could be even later, at least for as long as it took to pull up their records and get a jump on their info before everyone finally met. 

“We’ve never handled a crewmember transfer on this base before, it kind of got lost with all our cargo records,” she said, voice a little apologetic. Jim shrugged. 

“Don’t worry about it, I’m sure we’ve got time.”

“Should we interpret this tardiness as precedent for the work ethic of our new CMO?” Spock asked. Jim snorted. 

“I think we can give them a one-day grace period before we start telling on them to Starfleet.”

“That’s awful considerate of you,” someone said from the doorway behind them, and oh god. 

Oh  _ god. _

Jim knew that voice. 

From the tone of it, though, the guy didn’t seem to recognize the back of Jim’s head yet. 

_ Although he definitely should _ , Jim thought,  _ considering how much he saw of it last night-- _

Jim choked a little bit on his next breath, mentally kicking himself for even allowing his brain to replay that memory at a time like this. He cleared his throat, tried--and probably failed--to suppress the urge to blush, and turned around. 

“Are you the new CMO assigned to the Enterprise?” Spock asked, and thank fuck he did, because once Jim and his apparently-new-CMO-who-he-fucked-three-times-last-night-and-now-has-to-work-with locked eyes, Jim lost the ability to form thoughts with his brain and words with his mouth. 

It looked like he wasn’t the only one. It was completely and unbearably silent before he finally said, 

“Yes,”

at the same time the base manager piped up, 

“I found it! Leonard McCoy, CMO!”

Leonard-- _ jesus christ jesus FUCK _ \--swallowed hard and nodded, apparently unable to make eye contact with anyone except for Jim. All of a sudden Jim realized why he was so late, because his face was clean shaven, and his hair was styled, and he was wearing perfectly-pressed science blues. 

Jim had assumed last night that most of his attraction to Leonard came from the fact that he  _ didn’t _ look like a Starfleet officer. Apparently, that wasn’t it. 

“That’s me,” Leonard said. 

Jim sincerely hoped that Spock was as bad at interpreting social nuances as everyone assumed, because there was no way he sounded  _ anything _ but awkward when he finally blurted out, 

“Nice to meet you.”


	16. mckirk / humping on the couch / M

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this is more bittersweet than sexy but i thought i could write this after i got home from the movies and then the movie fucking destroyed me but anyway. 
> 
> this can (and probably should) be read as a continuation of day 10: secret crush.

day 16:** humping on the couch**

“What if someone hears us?”

“The only other person in this house is my mom,” Leonard mused, in between the kisses he was pressing against Jim’s neck and jaw, “She’s two floors up.”

“Mmh,” Jim sighed. He couldn’t really think of anything else to say, not when Leonard’s mouth was warm and soft against his skin and his hands were holding his waist, sliding down his sides to the swell of his ass. He was going to make some quip about _ sorry I’m poor and not used to being in some fancy three-story house _ but the train of thought sort of disappeared from his head as soon as his hips jerked forward, mostly on accident, and he could feel how hard Leonard was, too. 

It was only a two-story house, anyway. Technically. The basement was only big enough for the laundry room and a couch and a shelf full of dusty boxes and an old chunky television. 

A television which was currently on the highest volume possible, although Leonard’s mom probably couldn’t even hear the tv from the master bedroom, let alone the sound of Jim moaning in the back of his throat when Leonard grazed the curve of his neck with his teeth. 

“Relax,” he whispered, and Jim hadn’t even realized he was holding his breath until now. 

Jim didn’t want to admit that it wasn’t really Leonard’s mom he was worried about. It was Leonard. Leonard who was perfect and popular and on the football team and probably salutatorian (valedictorian if his grades hadn’t suffered a little a few weeks ago when he was running the school blood drive). Who was about to realize that Jim wasn’t good enough, would never be good enough for him. 

But he didn’t know that, yet, Jim told himself. He didn’t know and that’s why he held Jim like this, why he kissed Jim like he couldn’t get enough, why he breathed heavy and desperate when their hips lined up again and again, as if Jim was actually the person he wanted. 

He really was trying his best to believe Leonard when he said all those things, about how Jim was attractive, how he was smart, how he was  _ the most interesting person to ever walk the halls of this damn school _ \--but he just couldn’t. 

He could pretend, though, at least for tonight. At least while he had Leonard in his arms, on this tiny old couch in the basement. He could forget about all the things about them that didn’t work and focus on what did, right here, right now, when their breaths and their mouths and their bodies aligned--and at least for tonight Jim could believe he was enough. 


	17. mckirk / rebound relationship / E

day 17: **rebound relationship**

Jim hated to interrupt Leonard, he really did, but he had to ask. 

“Is this some sort of post-divorce rebound fuck?”

Leonard let out a bark of laughter against Jim’s collarbone, which felt like it echoed all the way down to his toes. And then he continued his journey down Jim’s chest, mouth and tongue and teeth mapping out the lines of his torso, his stomach, his hipbone. He paused right after his fingers dipped underneath the waistband of Jim’s boxer briefs. 

“For some reason I figured enlisting in Starfleet meant you had to be smart,” he mumbled, eyes trained on Jim’s body with a near-analytical intensity as he slowly undressed him the rest of the way. Jim lifted his hips without his needing to ask. “My mistake.”

“You’d be surprised how dumb I can be, actually.”

“Oh yeah?” Leonard asked, and took Jim’s cock in his mouth before Jim could even think of some witty response. 

“S-shit--” Jim stuttered, “Yeah.”

So fucking off onto that shuttle and joining Starfleet on two hours of sleep and a dare wasn’t a colossal waste of time. Not when the equally sleep-deprived bastard who’d ended up next to him, shared his flask, and then spent half the ride talking about how likely it was they’d never reach San Francisco alive--also gave really, really good head. 

Jim tried to keep himself quiet, unsure of how thin the walls of Leonard’s dorm room might be. And also paranoid that he might have to run into this guy for the next three years without really talking again and their relationship could ultimately be limited to one conversation on the shuttle and then, just, like, Jim’s moaning. But then Leonard swallowed Jim all the way down, built up a rhythm as if he knew  _ exactly _ what Jim liked, did something obscene with his tongue against the underside of Jim’s cock and Jim’s next breath broke off into a less-than-dignified whine. 

He slapped his hand over his mouth, gripping the headboard behind him with his other hand, but Leonard just hummed in encouragement, holding Jim down firmly by his hips and jesus fuck Jim liked that too, how did he know--how did he  _ know _ \--

“ _ Shit, _ ” he said into the palm of his hand. 

Jim wondered if it had been even a little bit genuine when Leonard invited him out for another drink once they stepped off the shuttle into the San Francisco sunshine, or if this is what he meant all along. It was still early afternoon anyway. They didn’t have to report to their orientation until the morning. They had time for a drink later, if Leonard would still be interested. 

The longer they spent in his tiny dorm bed, Leonard’s bags still packed and in a heap next to the doorway, with a corresponding heap of clothes between there and the bed, the more Jim hoped he would be. Because he gave good head, (and if he was so talented with his mouth to make Jim fall apart like he did, his hands were outright  _ deadly _ ) and because Leonard had shared his flask, and because he laughed when Jim accidentally kicked him and his hands were soft and gentle across Jim’s skin when they kissed lazily after he came. 

Jim wasn’t about to forget that this was, admittedly, a post-divorce rebound fuck. But he was allowed to hope that there was the potential for more. At the very least, the potential for more hookups, because Leonard fucked like a goddamn dream. 

“You’re just what I needed,” he said into the skin of Jim’s upper back, breath tickling his skin and making the hairs on his neck stand up. Now that he was giving Jim the best sex of his life instead of the best blowjob of his life, it turned out he was a talker. Although Jim probably should have seen it coming based on their shuttle ride this morning. 

“Am I?” Jim asked, because he was already getting fucked into the mattress, but getting his ego stroked wouldn’t hurt things either. 

If it was a little earlier in the afternoon Leonard probably would have made some quip about Jim being a narcissist, but at this point he was fucking him hard and breathing against his neck even harder and all he could do was hum in agreement, lips pressed to his skin. Or maybe it was a dismissive hum. Jim didn’t care. 

He came for a second time, trapped between the mattress and the solid weight of Leonard’s body, pulling Leonard over the edge with him just seconds later. Jim listened to their breathing as it slowed down and traced his fingertips lazily across Leonard’s lower back as they laid there, half on top of each other in the tiny bed. He tried to figure out what his plan was for making sure this happened again. 

Turned out he didn’t need to, because Leonard lifted his head up from Jim’s chest a few minutes later and just said, 

“Should we get something to eat, or what?”

Jim bit his lip and nodded and waited for Leonard’s head to fall back down again before he let himself start smiling like an idiot. 


	18. mckirk / coming in pants / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> helloooooo sorry for the late post but here it is folks. went for short and sweet but it didn't stay as short as originally intended, although i'm not apologizing for that part ;)

day 18: **coming in pants**

The thing about having sex with Bones, finally, and realizing--although Jim had suspected it all along--that he was _ really fucking good  _ at sex, was that every moment in which Jim was _ not  _ having sex with Bones was now unbearable. 

He hadn’t felt like this since he was a teenager, so completely powerless to his libido. He could hardly focus on anything except the thought of when he would see Bones again, as if they didn’t live on a starship where they knew exactly where to find each other at all times. 

To be honest, it was really fucking annoying. Jim was looking forward to the part where this little honeymoon phase ended. When his workdays wouldn’t feel so long anymore and they still got to have mindblowing sex but like, maybe also some quick vanilla sex so they also got to sleep at a decent hour. 

He forgot all of these desires for a calmer, simpler future as soon as the doors to his quarters opened and Bones walked in. 

That was another thing: Bones showed up to his quarters as soon as he got off his shift, now. He used to linger in his office, send Jim some comms about maybe hanging out, take himself to the mess and jump in the shower and then, if Jim was lucky, show up to his quarters a couple hours later. 

Bones definitely came straight from the Medbay. If Jim hadn’t gone full rose-colored glasses as soon as he walked in he probably would have complained about hospital smells and the stain on his uniform shirt. Instead he all but jumped up from the couch and was on Bones in about two seconds. 

At the very least, that heady, relentless desperation seemed to be mutual, which made Jim feel better about how hard he got just from  _ kissing him  _ in the doorway of his quarters while they were both fully clothed. Because Bones was just as needy, tonight, just like he’d been every night (and some mornings, and once in the ready room mid-shift) over the last two weeks, hands indecisively grabbing at Jim’s shirt and pulling him closer. He couldn’t seem to make up his mind about whether he wanted Jim naked or pressed against him from head to toe, as if those two options were mutually exclusive. 

See, if they were in a more well-adjusted phase of their sexual relationship, Jim could be coherent enough to make a joke about that. And then Bones’ thigh slipped between Jim’s legs and all he could do was whine in the back of his throat at the pressure against his cock. Bones breathed out a laugh and slid his hand down to the swell of Jim’s ass, urging him to roll his hips forward. 

“You want it so bad, don’t you,” he mumbled, lips so close to Jim’s own that it was actually torture. 

Oh yeah, and that was another thing: Bones talked. A lot. 

Jim’s next breath broke off into another little moan. 

“That’s okay. Me too. I’ve been thinking about this all day.”

Jim had really intended to bring their mouths together again, to shut Bones up and kiss him and hope to make it to the bed before he came in his pants like he was fourteen years old. Somehow his face ended up pressed into the curve of Bones’ neck. He could feel the blood rushing up his face all the way to his ears as Bones just  _ kept talking _ . 

“Thinking about you. I could hardly focus. It took everything I had not to march up to the bridge and take you into your ready room and bend you over the desk like I did a few days ago. Fuck you good and make you scream and then send you back to work.”

“Hnnnghghnhnhgh,” was the most eloquent response Jim could come up with. Because it was taking all of his cognitive function not to come immediately, from just the friction of Bones’ thigh and the sound of his voice and the fucking  _ words _ coming out of his mouth. 

“You liked that, huh.” 

Bones had basically coaxed Jim into a steady rhythm now, little rolls of his hips against his thigh. That bastard. 

“Or I thought about--calling you down to Medical. Making some excuse for an emergency check up. Put the privacy screens up around your bed and just--”

“Bones,” Jim finally grit out.

“What?”

“You gotta stop--I won’t--”

“Won’t what, Jim,” Bones asked quietly, and he knew, he knew  _ exactly _ what Jim was referring to, judging by the strong hand over Jim’s ass that kept pulling him forward again and again, giving his cock  _ just  _ enough pressure. Although normally this kind of thing wouldn’t have brought Jim so close so fast.

But nothing about what was going on between them was  _ normal _ , even by Jim’s standards. 

“I won’t--last long.”

Jim felt another little laugh rumble through Bones. 

“You think I was only gonna make you come once tonight?”

“Mmhmhmph.”

“I know,” he whispered into Jim’s hair, still rocking their bodies together in that same rhythm. “It’s okay, let go, I know you need it.”

Jim practically whimpered. He did need it. He didn’t know what the hell was going on with him. 

“It’s okay. You don’t have to do anything else tonight but lay back and let me make you feel good all over again. It’s all I can think about, since that first night. All the different ways I wanna touch you, and hear your--”

He came against Bones’ thigh, in his uniform, gasping as if it was any sort of surprise. And then he was ready to get annoyed again, except Bones basically carried him to the bed afterwards and made good on his promise and Jim wondered if this desperate, non-stop-sex honeymoon phase was really such an inconvenience, after all. 


	19. mckirk / no such thing as "just" friends / M

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO AND WELCOME TO THE CONCLUSION TO THE LOOPHOLE SERIES. YOU MADE IT. I MADE IT.   
first part is day 8: dancing and the second part is day 13: breaking the rules. keep an eye out because i'm probably going to post this as its own fic in a little while
> 
> go to end notes for content warnings but it's really just more pining and angst

day 19: **no such thing as "just" friends**

Jim’s leg had been shaking up and down, heel tapping on the floor incessantly, ever since he’d sat back down in the Captain’s chair. He hadn’t even bothered to change uniforms. The away mission earlier had left this one was a little bit torn and covered in blood but the thought still hadn’t crossed his mind. 

Ensign Ramsey had lived, of course. She was set to make a full recovery in the Medbay, even with the way her leg had been torn up and twisted and broken so bad that when Jim carried her from the transporter room to Medical she almost passed out from the pain. 

Jim blamed himself. Who the hell else’s fault could it have been? He was the one who’d concluded that the planet was safe and ordered his away team to spread out and catalog information on the terrain. Even though there was no way to know that the species that lived down there were avid hunters. Two of his officers bit the dust from a tripwire while the third got her leg caught (and practically destroyed) in a metal trap. 

It was his fault. But he was still Captain, and he still had three hours left in his shift and they still had to deliver some medical supplies to a colony on the other side of the star system today and he still had to put all of it in his Captain’s log. 

All he wanted to do was go down to Medbay and check on Ramsey and say sorry (again) and hear Bones say that she was going to be fine, that everything was going to be okay. 

Bones, dear god. There was another colossal fuck up that’d been weighing on him for the past few weeks. Ever since that stupid night on Vega when he’d drank too many of those stupid cocktails and couldn’t keep the lid on his loneliness and his years-long crush on his best friend and proceeded to hit on him in the most disingenuine and unsexy way possible. And the worst part was that it apparently worked. He suggested that the Captain and the CMO hooking up was technically some sort of loophole (which it was. Kind of. Well, it was a grey area) and Bones actually  _ went for it _ and they actually danced in that bar and kissed on the crowded dance floor and fucked in Jim’s quarters. 

The sex was good, because of course it was, but it wasn’t how Jim wanted it to happen and he couldn’t help being angry at himself over it. He had been in love with Bones for fucking _ years _ . He’d been thinking--dreaming, more like--about the moment they’d get together for so long, and then  _ that _ was how he did it? By calling Bones his fucking loophole? As if it was some sort of anecdotal, last minute,  _ might as well _ idea. Jim had wanted to sweep Bones off of his stupid cranky feet, for fuck’s sake. He’d wanted whatever happened between them to be real and genuine and not some nonsense about avoiding Starfleet regs. 

And now they were in such a mess. They were still hooking up, almost every day after work. Sometimes it seemed like Bones actually wanted it, like he thought about Jim--every once in a while a few words slipped out in the heat of the moment that made Jim feel like this was actually a relationship that both of them wanted to be a part of, and not some senior-officers-with-benefits bullshit. But then Bones always ran out of the room as soon as it was over, like he couldn’t bear to look at Jim again, let alone stay in bed with him. 

Jim had tried, that first night, to ask him to stay, but he’d fucked that up too. He’d  _ told _ Bones he  _ could _ stay, which wasn’t the same at all. 

They were good at compartmentalizing at least, meaning their relationship outside of Jim’s quarters didn’t seem to change at all, but that only made things worse, it felt like. It only encouraged that voice in Jim’s head that said Bones didn’t want to fuck  _ him _ , he just wanted to fuck. Why else was he holding back so much during sex? Why else would he be running away from Jim’s bed as soon as he came?

Great. Now Jim was both angry at himself and also pathetically sad. He wasn’t going to make another trip to Medbay, not like this. He was going to go to his quarters after his shift and change out of his blood-stained uniform and take a shower and get a fucking _ grip _ , and then he was going to go to  _ Bones’ _ quarters and tell him they needed to stop hooking up. It was the least stupid thing to do after a string of increasingly stupid things, and it would break his heart to close off this new part of his relationship with Bones, but to be honest, it was breaking his heart even more when he remembered how one-sided the whole thing was. He never should have started this in the first place. It’s common knowledge that you’re not supposed to initiate a friends-with-benefits relationship when you’re in fucking  _ love _ with your friend. 

Except the doors to Bones’ quarters opened a few seconds after Jim rang the bell at 2300. And Bones was in his pajamas and he looked freshly showered and he had a five o’clock shadow and Jim’s stupidity took over. Because he was stupid and in love and also  _ stupid _ . He felt his eyes go wide and was effectively just staring at Bones, silently, and then Bones smiled a little bit like he might be about to laugh and Jim felt a dam burst in his heart--and he wasn’t even sure if that was a good thing--and he stepped inside of Bones’ quarters and took his face in his hands and kissed him. 

He kissed Bones because he could, because they did that now, because it felt so good that Jim could ignore how much it hurt, too. 

And Bones led them to the bed, to _ his _ bed, which Jim realized they’d never had sex in before this, and Jim was forced to remember what this was all about. What this was  _ only _ about, for Bones at least. 

He was such an idiot. 

Bones slipped his hands underneath Jim’s shirt and pulled it off in what was becoming and easy, practiced motion, kissing him again as soon as the soft cotton was lifted over his head. Jim wanted to talk. He wanted to talk about the away mission and Ensign Ramsey’s leg and how fucking cartoony it had been to see two officers fall victim to a goddamn tripwire. He wanted to talk about everything, but that wasn’t what they did here. They talked  _ outside _ of the bedroom, over drinks and over dinner and in the corridors when Bones sometimes needlessly walked Jim to the bridge. They didn’t talk in here. 

So he kissed Bones harder instead, deeper, pulling him to settle over Jim like a blanket. Except everything he did seemed to make it worse. Every touch of Bones’ hands to his skin, every soft, skillful press of his lips and tongue and the gentle grazing of his teeth, the hand that slipped between their bodies to palm at Jim’s cock over his sweats made everything worse because Jim didn’t  _ want  _ this. 

Well, he wanted it. He wanted everything Bones would give him. Just not this, right now, for some reason. 

He wondered why he even initiated sex tonight if it was making him feel so bad. Why he’d even come to Bones’ quarters. He knew, somewhere in the back of his mind, that he wasn’t going to be able to end their sexual relationship, even as he was making the short walk down the hall from his own quarters. And he still came. If he didn’t want sex, why the hell did he still come over?

The question filled up his brain, and brought a lot of self-hatred kind of thoughts with it, some stuff from his younger years of being used and abused by sexual partners that he thought were effectively buried, and soon he couldn’t do anything right. He couldn’t kiss Bones. He couldn’t even lie underneath him without squirming uncomfortably. He just wanted this to be over but he didn’t want to end it, didn’t want to give Bones the impression that he wasn’t attracted to him or something. 

Thankfully Bones was a lot smarter and a hell of a lot more perceptive than he was. He pushed himself up on one arm over Jim and looked down at him, seemed to sense that Jim was about five seconds away from a full-blown anxiety attack and immediately started shifting back into best-friend mode. 

“I knew something was wrong,” he said, and the sex ended there, and Jim hated how relieved he felt when Bones climbed off of him to sit next to him on the bed instead. 

“I’m sorry,” he blurted out. God, he was ruining everything. He scrubbed his face with his hands. 

“What just happened? What can I do?”

Jim let out a shaky breath, still hiding behind his hands. 

“I made such a mess,” he mumbled.

“Ramsey’s gonna be fine. Stop blaming yourself for that.” 

This wasn’t what they did here. Jim wasn’t supposed to get emotional right now, he was supposed to wait until after the hookup, after they’d slept it off in separate beds, and casually joke about his issues over breakfast. That was what they did. They didn’t do this--talking about Jim’s feelings in  _ bed _ together where they’d almost had  _ sex _ just now. 

“No, everything,” Jim said quietly. “I fucked everything up. With you.”

“I was having a good time, just now.”

Jim wanted to scream. Bones didn’t  _ get _ it. He didn’t get that Jim was broken and messy and hopelessly in love with him. He just thought this was some casual hookup gone wrong. 

“You don’t get it,” Jim said, and he hated himself for even saying it and hated himself more for how pathetic and wobbly his voice sounded.

Suddenly Bones’ hands were back, pulling Jim’s away from his face, helping him to sit up on the bed to face him. Jim didn’t know how to catalog all of this in his head. He didn’t know if this was doctor Bones or best friend Bones or casual hookup Bones, didn’t know which one of them was speaking when he said, 

“Explain it to me,”

with so much care and seriousness in his voice. 

Jim rubbed his eyes again with the back of his hand. They were dry, at least. He wasn’t about to start  _ crying _ in bed with Bones, thank god. 

“I didn’t mean to--” he cut off. Tried again. Because he  _ did _ mean to, “--I mean, I didn’t want--”

Jim sighed. 

“I didn’t want it to happen like this. Between us. I didn’t want it to start like this.”

Bones was watching him so carefully, and he was holding back, again, like he always did when they were together ever since that night on Vega. He was holding back and all Jim could think was that whatever it was he couldn’t say had to be something bad. Something about how much of a fuck-up Jim was. About how Bones didn’t want feelings to get involved. Jim had already dug himself a hole he couldn’t get out of anymore. He couldn’t stop what came out next. 

“I want you. And this. I have for years, I mean, fuck, I just--I fucked it up and it’s not real and I didn’t mean to drag you into my feelings when I told you it wouldn’t mean anything and I’m sorry. I know I made you think this wasn’t complicated but it’s been so complicated for me and I don’t think we can do this anymore.”

Jim was two seconds away from hiding his face again, or maybe even running out like Bones always did and leaving an even bigger mess in his wake. But he froze, because Bones was looking at him, and something softened in his big, dark eyes, and he slowly started to smile. 

“Why are you smiling.”

“Because I’m such an idiot.”

“Usually you’re smiling because _ I’m _ an idiot.”

“Oh, you are too,” Bones said, but he wasn’t even mad. His mouth was hanging open like he’d just had an epiphany. Jim had no idea what he was supposed to do at this point. His brain was still halfway in panic mode. “For how you decided to seduce me. You called me a  _ loophole _ before taking me home and now you’re surprised I didn’t think you had feelings for me?”

“Wait, Bones, do you--”

“ _ Yes, _ idiot.”

And then for some reason Jim started laughing. Probably because if he didn’t he would do something even worse, like start sobbing. He dragged a hand down his face, covering his eyes. 

“God, I’m so stupid.”

“I think I’m at least half-responsible for this mess, too. I could’ve said something.”

“Yeah, you really could’ve.”

Bones moved Jim’s hand away from his face again, but this time he held it in his own. Jim’s panicky energy was slowly draining out of him, leaving him completely exhausted. 

“Are you okay?” Bones asked, and it was like he was in doctor mode and best-friend mode and hookup mode all at once. Jim realized that this was exactly what he’d wanted all along. He took a shaky breath. 

“Yeah. Yeah. I just got confused because I felt like I needed to see you and so I assumed that meant I wanted sex but….maybe not tonight.”

Bones nodded slowly. He didn’t let go of Jim’s hand, didn’t kick him out, didn’t stiffen up or get awkward and Jim felt like he could really breathe again, finally. 

“I think I just...needed to be with you. Like this. Just--”

“I get it, Jim.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” Bones said. He pulled Jim forward, let go of his hand to wrap his arms around him and  _ now _ there were tears in Jim’s eyes, as he pressed his face into the curve of Bones’ neck, because  _ this _ was really all he needed. Just being held, being close to Bones. Fucking  _ talking _ to him for once about all this shit they’d created. He curled his hands into his soft pj shirt, not to pull it off, but just to remind himself that Bones was there. 

“Are we gonna be okay?” he asked. Bones’ hands were warm and steady over his back, even though Jim felt when his breath caught in his throat at the question. 

“Yeah,” he said, “I think so.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> content warnings:  
an ensign gets injured before this fic starts and theres some descriptions of a very bad broken leg and also references to blood  
there is referenced/implied abuse in jim's past that comes up for him during sex and nearly causes a panic attack
> 
> sorry yall idk where this came from


	20. mckirk / failure to perform / M

day 20: **failure to perform**

Jim freezes. He can’t panic. He shouldn’t. Because panicking is only going to make things worse. 

As if the situation could be made any worse. His cock has just gone soft while it was  _ in Bones’ mouth _ . 

Okay, he’s panicking. Even though he knows this is only going to ensure that his boner never comes back. He can’t stop the alarms going off in his head and the way his body is tensing up and the mortified blush on his face. 

Bones, of course, is a gentleman about it. He sits back on his heels and looks up at Jim. For some reason Jim is expecting to be laughed at. This has never happened to him before, obviously ( _ obviously _ ), so he’s surprised when Bones is looking at him with nothing negative or mocking in his expression, only a little bit of concern. 

“Everything alright?” he asks, and he’s so goddamn earnest, and understanding, and he’s not running away from Jim and this is why Jim  _ wanted _ this to be so good to begin with. Ever since that stammering love confession Bones made when they were trapped in a cell together on Kaylor II Jim has been thinking about this moment, the part where they finally have sex. It has to be good,  _ he _ has to be good, and he’s already fucked it up after five minutes. 

He sighs and scrubs his face with his hands. He’s already naked in front of Bones, who only made it down to his slacks and undershirt before insisting on going down on him. He doesn’t know if he can handle being any more vulnerable with his best friend tonight. 

Except Bones _ is _ his best friend. That’s the point, isn’t it? He’s not some one-time hookup or fuckbuddy or whatever. Bones has been here for years, for all of it. He’s seen Jim at his absolute worst and stuck around until today anyway. For some reason Jim still feels like he’s letting him down, like Bones came in here thinking about their Academy years when Jim was essentially a sex addict and rumors about his sexual prowess bounced around campus. Only for Jim to lose his hard-on in five minutes. 

But Bones is still here, hasn’t run away yet--he hasn’t run away, still, after much worse things than this--so Jim sighs and moves to sit on the edge of his bed. Bones comes to sit next to him a second later. 

“Sorry, I don’t know what happened,” Jim says, looking down at his knees. Out of the corner of his eye he can see Bones’ uniform slacks, his thigh just inches away. “This doesn’t happen to me. I promise. I don’t know where it came from. It wasn’t anything you did.”

“Jim, really, it’s not a big deal.”

Jim sighs again, leaning forward to hold his face in his hands. He props his elbows up on his knees, now staring at an unassuming patch of the floor. 

“I feel like it is.”

“It’s not.”

“So you haven’t spent the last five years hearing people call me a sex god? You came in here with no expectations?”

“I came in here expecting to have sex with  _ you _ , not with a sex god.”

Jim can’t help but laugh at that. It’s literally impossible to tell if Bones had intended for it to come out as comforting or insulting but it somehow managed to be both. He remembers all of a sudden that this is his best friend in the entire universe and stops hiding his face in his hands, straightens up so they can look at each other. 

“There we go,” Bones says quietly, smiling a little. 

“I’m sorry.”

“Stop apologizing,” he says, and now he’s starting to look annoyed, too, like he’s maybe two seconds away from rolling his eyes into another star system. It actually makes Jim feel better. 

“Clearly  _ you _ were the one with too many expectations that your dick couldn’t keep up with.”

Jim laughs again. He never knew it was possible to laugh when he felt so vulnerable and open and known, but here he is, and Bones is still smiling at him in that little way he does when he can’t manage to stay annoyed at him. It’s a good thing, he realizes. Even if he doesn’t get to blow Bones’ mind tonight. 

He scoots closer to Bones so he can rest his head against his shoulder, and Bones’ arm wraps around him like it’s second nature. 

“I _ am _ going to give you mind blowing sex, at some point.”

“Sure.”

“Don’t believe me?”

“Oh, I believe you alright,” Bones says, “But you know you could underwhelm me in bed every single time and I’d still stick around.”

Jim wrinkles his nose. 

“I don’t know if that makes me feel better.”

Bones breathes out a laugh and pulls him closer, and the kiss he presses to Jim’s forehead, at least, makes him feel a lot better. 


	21. mckirk / valentines / T

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bit of a loose interpretation of this prompt, but whatever. 
> 
> also how are there only ten days left???? what the hell??? yall im shocked i even made it this far but it's starting to seem like i actually might pull off the entire month after all

day 21: **valentines**

_ I have some reports I need to go over _ had been a lie. The real reason Jim went to hide in his office halfway through his shift today was just because he had to breathe for a second. Because everything had gone to shit a couple days ago and he could barely make it through a full shift now without his bad mood starting to surface in front of the crew.

At this point he just needed to announce himself as emotionally compromised, except he didn’t think he was going to be able to look Spock in the eye and tell him he had to step down for a few days because him and Bones were  _ fighting _ . 

It was a big fight, though. About family and the future and the reason they were even attempting to have a goddamn relationship in the first place. Jim knew he was partially to blame for letting things go unaddressed for so long and then springing all of his insecurities on Bones at once, but he didn’t feel guilty at all for the fight that followed after Bones admitted he didn’t want Jim to meet his daughter, _ still _ , after they’d been friends all through the Academy and something like boyfriends ever since the Narada. 

Maybe from Bones’ perspective Jim had overreacted, but one thing led to another and they ended up shouting at each other over a long list of things and Jim had wished it was possible to slam the door of Bones’ quarters behind him when he stormed out. He hadn't slept at all after that, because as soon as he fell angrily into his own bed, alone, in the dark, the fear crept in that things were about to be over. 

The next morning Jim began his systematic avoidance of Bones every single day, even though it was only confirming the accusation Bones had made of Jim being “ _ so damn immature _ ”. For some reason the only thing keeping him sane right now was completely sidestepping the conversation he knew they were going to have when they saw each other again: the one where Bones dumped him. 

It was keeping him sane but it still made it really fucking hard to work. 

Hence the midday retreat to his office so he could brood for an hour before plastering another smile on his face and returning to the bridge. 

He wanted to laugh at the fact that it was such a  _ Bones _ thing to do, to have scheduled brooding sessions, although it shouldn’t have come as a surprise after the nearly five years they’d known each other. And then he didn’t laugh because that thought only made him feel worse. 

There was just a constant swirl of emotions inside of him every day now, equal parts fear and dread and anger and hurt and a healthy bit of self hatred to top it all off. He was ready to brood it all out for a little bit when the doors to his office swished closed behind him and he wondered if he might have walked into the wrong room. 

On his desk was a vase full of roses. A  _ huge _ amount of roses. Jim looked around just to make sure he was in his office after all, and then carefully approached the flowers. There was a card. 

_ Jim-- _

_ don’t make me schedule a mandatory check up just to get you down here _

_ Leonard _

And maybe Jim was being irrational, still, but the flowers and the note and the stupid fucking gesture only made him angrier. The things they’d fought over had been a big fucking deal, and they’d had to dredge up all of Jim’s stupid family trauma and insecurities only for them to reach no sort of closure whatsoever, and now Bones thought he could just send roses with a fucking  _ joke _ on the card?

He tore up the card and collapsed into his chair and had to brood extra hard, now, with that stupid vase of roses right there in front of him. 

-

There were daisies two days later. Jim almost tore the note, again, without opening it, but he felt a little pang of guilt at the thought, so he glared at the words while he read them, hoping he could burn two eye-shaped holes through the note instead. 

_ Jim-- _

_ I’m sorry I forgot you don’t like roses. Let me know how you feel about daisies instead. They always remind me of you, anyway.  _

_ Leonard _

-

Daisies again, the next day, and the next, and now there was a fucking collection of flower vases on his desk and Jim hoped nobody else was coming in here. 

Today’s note just said, 

_ Jim-- _

_ do I have to come all the way up to the bridge? I just want to talk to you. _

_ Leonard _

Jim sent a comm to Yeoman Rand to come up to his office. Her eyes went wide when she came inside just to see her Captain sitting in his chair, fingers tapping impatiently on the surface of his desk while he glared at four vases full of flowers in front of him. He tried to play it cool while he instructed her to take them down to Leonard McCoy in the Medbay and say that he must have gotten them by mistake, and that he’s sure Doctor McCoy will know what to do with them. 

He wanted to add a note to one of the vases that said  _ shove them up your ass _ but he knew that this definitely counted as being immature. 

It was satisfying enough just to have them off of his desk. 

-

Except Bones kept sending fucking flowers--or maybe he was sneaking up to Jim’s office and delivering them himself? And Jim kept sending them back down to Medbay. Even though he’d sworn her to secrecy he knew something had to give eventually. People were going to catch on to the fact that Yeoman Rand was walking the same course through the ship carrying vases full of flowers, probably looking increasingly annoyed as the days went on because this really wasn’t in her job description. 

Jim knew he was caught when he excused himself to his office and Spock followed after him. 

He was about to say what Jim knew he was going to say, that his relationship drama was becoming common knowledge and him and the Doctor needed to get the hell over it on their own time and stop exhausting their staff. Jim didn’t try to stop him. He knew he deserved the coming lecture. 

They both went speechless, though, when they stepped into Jim’s office to a sea of flowers covering almost every inch of the room. Jim felt his jaw drop. 

Spock just straightened up, scanned his eyes across the room for a moment and then seemingly gave up. 

“At this point I can see it is unnecessary for me to tell you that the correspondence between you and Doctor McCoy needs to be brought under control.”

Jim snorted.  _ Correspondence _ . That was one way to say it. The word he would’ve used was probably  _ shenanigans _ or  _ dumpster fire _ or maybe s _ hitshow _ . 

“I’ll take care of it.”

It turned out that among the sixty or so vases full of flowers that filled Jim’s office, only  _ one  _ of them had a note. He didn’t even know why he bothered looking after the first few had come up empty. He begrudgingly opened the note once he’d found it. 

_ Jim-- _

_ If you’re reading this, that means you went through the trouble of finding it, which means a part of you must still care. How about you prove it to me by coming to my quarters tonight.  _

_ I’m not going to break up with you, you idiot. I’m going to apologize.  _

_ Please come and please tell me I can stop bothering Sulu to get these damn flowers.  _

_ your Leonard _

Jim couldn’t even get angry at this one, but he wanted to. He wanted to be angry at Bones for what he’d said during that fight two and a half weeks ago and he wanted to be angry about the stupid flowers and the notes and the fact that they’d apparently  _ both _ been antagonizing the crew over all of it. All he could do was drop his face into his hand as a blush crept up his neck. 

The doors to his office opened a few seconds later, and Ensign Chekov got halfway through telling him that they needed him back on the bridge when he noticed all the flowers and just asked, 

“Is it Valentine’s Day or something?”

-

Jim didn’t even know what he was feeling when he stood in front of Bones’ quarters that night. He’d been impatient through the rest of his shift, and then once it was over he procrastinated all evening on heading over there. And now he couldn’t ring the bell and also couldn’t seem to walk away, either. 

Finally he wiped his sweaty hands on his slacks and rang. 

“Come in.”

Okay, Jim knew what he was feeling: terrified. But he didn’t really know why. 

Bones was sitting on the couch in the middle of the room but he stood up as soon as Jim walked in. There was a bottle of scotch on the coffee table--a really good one, from the looks of it--unopened with two empty glasses. It must have been the last of Bones’ romantic gestures, Jim realized, after he also realized that somewhere in the back of his mind he’d been expecting even more flowers. But when he saw Bones, really saw him, standing there looking all unsure, he didn’t want any gestures anymore. He’d never wanted them. 

The words  _ your Leonard _ flashed through his mind again. His heart sank to think about how difficult this must have been for Bones, too. He’d thought Jim was going to break up with him, hadn’t he. 

“No flowers?” Jim asked, because he really didn’t know what the hell else to say. 

Bones shrugged his shoulders. 

“Just me.”

Jim let out a long exhale. 

“That’s all I want, anyway.”

Bones’ entire posture seemed to slump, and he stepped around the coffee table and across the room towards Jim and Jim didn’t even have to think about the way his arms opened to pull him forward the rest of the way. He had been so angry at Bones in the past two weeks that he forgot what he was missing out on, the warmth of his arms, the familiar smell of his cologne and his shampoo and just a little bit of that soap they use in the Medbay. The way he always held Jim so tightly like he might float away in space otherwise. 

This whole time he’d dreaded talking to Bones but now that he was here it was the easiest thing in the world. 

“We need to stop fighting. The crew is complaining.”

Bones huffed out a laugh against Jim’s shoulder. 

“I might be indebted to Sulu for the rest of the mission,” he said flatly, and then, more seriously, “I’m sorry, you know. I didn’t realize--”

“Not now,” Jim said. He spread his palms out across the width of Bones’ back, feeling his whole life settle down again and shift back into place. “We can talk about it later. I just want this right now.”

He felt Bones take a deep breath, holding Jim just a little bit tighter. 

“Okay,” he whispered into the curve of Jim’s neck, and followed the word with the soft press of his lips to Jim’s skin. 


	22. mcspirk / multiple partners / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> um HELLO. ship change (kind of)  
mckirk is still basically the main ship. the au here is that jim and bones have been together for a really long time and are open to some changes in the bedroom ;)

day 22: **multiple partners**

He only ever watched. 

Jim had told him in no uncertain terms that he could do more than that, if he wanted, coming as close as he could to all-out inviting Spock for a  _ threesome _ with him and Bones. It had been enough work to get Bones to begrudgingly admit, the morning after it first happened, that he’d liked it, knowing Spock was watching them from the doorway of their shared bathroom. That he  _ liked  _ Spock. Jim hadn’t seen him flustered like that in  _ years _ . 

He didn’t know what he was expecting, if Spock would just catalogue that information in his brain for the next time he walked in on them  _ accidentally _ . He certainly didn’t expect for Spock to walk in on them on purpose. Except that he did. And when it happened (which it seemed like it was happening more frequently lately) all he did was watch them. 

Jim had to admit it was already pretty fucking hot, to look over Bones’ shoulder during sex and see Spock watching them so closely, his eyes uncharacteristically dark. He thought about the view Spock must have, of Bones towering over Jim, pressing him into the mattress and wringing moans out of him with every thrust of his hips. And then his eyes flicked down Spock’s body, still completely in uniform while he and Bones were naked on the bed, and Spock was  _ hard.  _

It was debatable, but the sight of Spock’s hard-on was probably what made him come less than a minute later. 

Bones caught on. Or maybe he just got tired. He rolled them over and told Jim to ride him, and even though Jim was still a little dizzy from the aftershocks of his orgasm he climbed on top without a second thought, facing the door, and sank back onto Bones’ cock. 

He was surprised he didn’t get hard again two seconds later, because now he was riding Bones while he slid his hands almost reverently across his waist, his hips, his thighs, everywhere--and Spock was staring at him. Even from across the room he felt like he was trapped between Spock and Bones and god, if that wasn’t exactly where he’d always wanted to be. 

He could see Spock’s hands subtly clenching and unclenching at his sides, and decided that if it didn’t work, he could just blame it on being all loopy and post-orgasm. 

“Come here,” he breathed. 

Bones’ hands tightened around his hips and Jim figured he was seeing it too, seeing Spock actually walk towards the bed. Slow and careful, like he had all the time in the world. Jim started losing control of his pace on Bones’ cock the closer he got. He risked reaching out towards Spock, urging him not to stop at just the foot of the bed, caught his arm and pulled him forward enough that one of his knees rested on the mattress and he was leaning over Jim and Bones, now, and Jim kept pulling. 

He brought their mouths together and one of Spock’s hands immediately wrapped tightly around the back of Jim’s neck and Bones’ fingertips were still pressing bruises into his hips and now he really  _ was _ trapped between them. 

He moaned into Spock’s mouth and tried to find his pace again, but it didn’t really matter, because he could already hear the signs that Bones was about to come. And he wondered what _ he _ was seeing as he did. Jim on top of him, which was familiar, but Spock at the end of the bed, fully dressed, kneeling towards Jim and kissing him like it was more important than breathing. 

Jim was pretty sure he could die like this. 


	23. mckirk / long distance relationship / T

day 23: **long distance relationship **

Jim felt selfish for even complaining about it. They’d both enlisted in Starfleet. That didn’t just mean getting to explore the galaxy; that meant helping people in need. That meant when two ships’ full of refugees from a destroyed mining colony were moved to the nearest starbase--one with only a skeleton of a medical staff--and Leonard saw the request for additional doctors, and  _ Jim _ saw that their ship was only two days away, they went. 

They went, and the miners and their families were suffering from external burns and internal damage to their lungs and trauma from the catastrophe, and Leonard stayed. 

“Six weeks, tops,” he’d said then, and Jim didn’t even think twice before agreeing, assigning M’Benga to take over as CMO in the interim. Leonard was a talented doctor, and amazing officer, a great leader. Jim had gone so far as to say he was the best doctor in the Fleet, except the one time he said that everyone joked about him being incredibly biased. And that was before they were even a couple.

That was the thing. 

They weren’t a couple, exactly. When that catastrophe struck they had just entered some sort of limbo of almost-couple. Meaning they’d said some things to each other, serious things that Jim didn’t think he’d ever be capable of saying, or feeling. And they’d kissed each other, then, right before Leonard was called down to Sickbay for a medical emergency and Jim fell asleep waiting up for him. 

Leonard woke him up when he got back, with soft lips against his forehead and cheek and jaw and neck and all Jim could remember from that night was feeling sleepy and warm and wrapped up in his sheets, and then Leonard climbed into bed next to him. He’d slipped Jim’s pjs off so gently that Jim didn’t even remember having to move his sleep-heavy limbs, and he went from being surrounded by blankets to surrounded by Leonard--his mouth, his hands, his voice low and breathless against his ear like the whole galaxy only extended to the edges of Jim’s bed and there was no need to talk any louder. 

Jim never knew sex could be like that. 

And then they woke up the next morning, sheets kicked around and tangled in between their legs and Leonard grinned lazily at him from the other side of the bed and Jim felt like his heart was going to explode out of his chest. 

Jim was late to the bridge by a few minutes, but he arrived right on time for them to get that distress call. He didn’t even think about that night Leonard spent in his bed until days later, after Leonard and a few other crew members had been successfully transferred to the base for the next six weeks. 

Six weeks turned into two months after Leonard insisted over a conference call that he wasn’t going to leave until Starfleet made plans for resettlement of the refugees, because he needed to ensure that there was a full medical staff ready to receive them. Jim hadn’t thought twice before approving that, too. By all accounts Doctor McCoy was the only thing keeping an entire starbase full of refugees and inexperienced personnel together. Jim trusted that he knew best. 

Except he got in bed that night, four and a half weeks after the distress call, and everything came flooding back to him, about Leonard in bed next to him, about the words they said to each other that night, about that big fat  _ question mark _ that was now their relationship status. 

It was surprising, really, that he managed to avoid thinking about it for more than a month, because after that it became  _ all _ he thought about. 

Two months turned to three. Jim split off from the rest of the crew for his shore leave to see Leonard, which everyone assumed was a Captain-checking-up-on-his-crew thing. Really it was just a Jim-was-going-to-die-if-he-was-away-from-Leonard-for-one-more-minute thing. 

Jim didn’t know what he was expecting when they finally saw each other again. Obviously they weren’t going to go running into each other’s arms and have desperate I-missed-you sex right there on the floor of the Sickbay and then ride a shuttlecraft off into the nonexistent sunset. But when he arrived to Sickbay to meet up with Leonard and the medical staff he felt a little twinge of pain in his heart as they talked to each other just like before. Not before the mine collapsed and Leonard relocated, but before  _ that night _ . 

He effectively ignored it by going into full Captain mode, and insisted on seeing and speaking to everyone. 

Leonard really was keeping the whole place together. The starbase was all but bursting at the seams with the increased capacity and the fact that it wasn’t intended to be a long term residence at  _ all  _ for non-essential crew. And yet nearly all of the refugees from the collapsed mine were making a full recovery, shifting their focus to grief counseling and applying for relocation. Jim almost wondered if he should have left more of his crew on the base to handle it all, but, unsurprisingly, Leonard’s instinct to  _ care for everyone without a second thought  _ had kicked in and was still keeping him going. Jim was amazed, even though he’d known all along that this was the kind of person Leonard was. 

He felt tired enough by the time they got back to Leonard’s quarters on the starbase that he could have forgotten his heartache for a little longer, maybe even for the rest of the night, and then the doors closed behind him and Leonard slumped forward into his arms. Jim wrapped his arms around him and held on for dear life, like he was sure that  _ letting go _ again meant  _ letting go for three months _ again. Leonard sighed. Jim tried to think of what to say next, which needy, insecure question he wanted Leonard to answer first. Except Leonard shifted in his arms and picked his head up and kissed him before he could. 

It was like nothing had changed at all, like no time had even passed. They fell into bed and Jim could forget the fact that he’d spent the last three months in bed alone, because Leonard was here, and now, and everything. 

And then he woke up hours later because he was freezing cold and Leonard’s bed--on top of being  _ just _ big enough for the two of them--only had one blanket. His instincts told him to yank the blanket back and just fall asleep again, but he saw Leonard sleeping, right there next to him, face smushed against the pillows, and stopped. 

The realization that he would only get to see this for the weekend, and then he’d have to leave again and it’d be business as usual, and then Leonard would come back, eventually-- _ and then what? _ \--woke him up the rest of the way. He watched Leonard’s sleep-softened features, the shadow of stubble on his cheeks and the way his hands fisted in the pillow under his head and the gentle rise and fall of his chest and he couldn’t shut off his brain. Were they a couple? Were they anything? Did Leonard even think about this while he was out here in the middle of nowhere?

He had no idea how much longer Leonard was going to be here, but he knew he was leaving in three days, and he knew he’d regret it if he kept all of this bottled up. 

Leonard frowned and muttered something in his sleep as Jim attempted to nudge him awake--which he had to admit was completely and utterly adorable--and then he managed to get his eyes open enough to give him something of a glare.

“What.”

“Bones.”

“Jim. What.”

“Are we a couple?”

Leonard let out a long exhale and rolled onto his back, bringing his hands up to rub the sleep from his eyes. 

“Yes?”

“What kind of an answer is that?”

“The kind of answer you get when you wake me up in the middle of the night?”

Jim propped himself up on his elbow so he could grab his pillow with his other hand and hit Leonard in the chest with it. Leonard coughed somewhat dramatically, and Jim was expecting another glare except that he moved his hands away from his eyes and reached for Jim instead. 

“Okay, you infant, I’m awake. Come here.”

He pulled Jim closer, although they really had no option  _ but  _ to be close in this tiny bed. Jim was basically on top of him at this point, feeling the warmth of Leonard’s chest under his palms. Leonard pulled the blanket over Jim’s back, and he was warm again. But it wasn’t the same. 

“What’s going on in your head?” Leonard asked. Jim had had no idea he’d spent this entire time waiting for Leonard to ask  _ exactly _ that until he finally heard it. 

“I just…” he started, sliding his fingertips across Leonard’s skin and feeling the soft hair on his chest, the knob of one collarbone. “I feel like we got interrupted. And everything happened so fast and then you were gone and I don’t know what I’m supposed to think. About us.”

Leonard watched him carefully, for a moment, like he was thinking. 

“I’m sorry.”

“About what?”

“I should’ve tried to keep better contact, I just--”

“Don’t apologize for that,” Jim cut in, a little bit of his Captain voice slipping out, “You’re the only thing holding this place together, don’t apologize for being busy.”

“Well it’s really not an excuse. I could have called you more.”

Jim wasn’t going to argue with that because, well, he  _ could’ve _ .

“But mainly I’m sorry that I didn’t think you need reassuring.”

“I guess I do, a little bit,” Jim said quietly, looking down at his hands on Leonard’s chest. He felt the blanket shifting and then Leonard was hooking one finger under his chin, urging him to look up again. 

“Did you miss the part where I told you I’m in love with you?”

Jim smiled a little bit. 

“No.”

“Should I say it again?”

He smiled even wider.

“Maybe.”

“Fine,” Leonard huffed, and he was  _ so _ pretending to be annoyed, because there wasn’t even a trace of irritation in his face when he said, “I’m in love with you. And as soon as I can leave this shithole I’m gonna show you just how much of a couple we are.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” he said. Jim leaned forward to kiss him, while he could, while they were in this weird little bed on this starbase full of people whose lives Leonard had saved. 

Everything was going to be okay, he told himself, and Leonard was going to come home, it was just a matter of time. Jim had waited three months already, anyway, and before that he’d waited pretty much his whole life for this. 

In the end, Leonard finished treating everyone and negotiating for their relocation within the following three weeks, and then sent out a request for the Enterprise to come pick him and the crew members up. Jim liked to think their daily video calls, after he left, had something to do with it. 


	24. mckirk / wildcard / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO SORRY IT'S SO LATE i was feeling very uninspired by todays prompts. here is some shameless smut. if you squint it's from the same story as chapter 18

day 24: **wildcard**

Leonard would probably never get tired of the sight of Jim underneath him. Not that it had even been that long already, since they’d first had sex. 

Jim underneath him and still mostly in  _ uniform _ , well, that was just priceless. 

They couldn’t even lie to themselves that they were being subtle about this. Leonard had come up to the bridge and requested to speak to Jim privately in his office a total of, oh, three times during this entire mission? And two of those were in the last  _ week _ . But Leonard really didn’t give two fucks if everyone was sitting out there on the bridge speculating about what he and Jim were doing in here, because he needed Jim, and he needed him now. 

“God…. _ Bones _ \--” Jim gritted out, and Leonard ran a soothing hand up his spine, over that gold uniform that fit him so well he could hardly push it up to reveal his smooth, pale skin underneath. When they got back to Jim’s quarters tonight he’d take it off all the way, and slowly. For now he barely even had the patience to pull Jim’s slacks down over his ass before he bent him over the surface of his desk. 

“I’m here,” he mused. He wrapped his hands around Jim’s hips and guided him back to meet his next thrust. 

“Talk--talk to me,” Jim said. 

“Yeah?”

“Please.”

“You want me to tell you how fucking good you feel around my cock?”

Jim keened in the back of his throat, like he was trying to hold back. He didn’t have to. The walls were soundproof and the office was effectively locked to all override codes except for their own. Leonard wanted to hear Jim moan, and whine, and beg for more. But he knew this was part of it, too, thinking they might get caught. Jim liked it. 

“So good I couldn’t even wait until tonight. I was in my office all morning thinking about this. I thought about making myself come on my own, that’s how hard you make me.”

“ _ Fuck, _ ” Jim breathed. Leonard was already starting to recognize that tone of voice, knew it meant Jim was getting close. He would have loved to drag it out, to keep Jim on the edge as long as possible, for as long as it took for Jim to stop holding back, but they really  _ did _ have to get back to work soon. 

“You close?”

Jim nodded a little bit, as much as he could the way he was bracing himself against his desk. 

“Why don’t you go ahead and let everyone hear you?” Leonard asked, leaning over Jim so he could find just the right angle, so he could speak low and close to Jim’s ear. “You’ll have to walk back out onto the bridge anyway, with your face red and your clothes all wrinkled and everyone will know I just fucked you good. And then when your shift finally ends and you run to the turbolift nobody’s gonna bat an eye because they know you’re coming back to me for more.”

Jim choked a little bit on his next breath and came, just like that, with his cock untouched underneath the table, gasping for air as Leonard kept fucking into him, chasing his own orgasm. 

And the dirty talk was just that-- _ talk _ \--because they ended up spending the next ten minutes doing damage control and making sure neither of them looked post-coital by the time they walked back onto the bridge. Jim was getting good at this part, and went on and on about some made-up data analytics he had asked Leonard to do with the Enterprise’s medical files the entire time he walked Leonard to the turbolift. 

There wasn’t even a trace of innuendo in his voice when he looked Leonard right in the eyes, right before the doors closed between them, and said, 

“We’ll keep in touch.”

Yeah, that was one way to look at it. 


	25. mckirk / nice guys come last / M

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know usually we like to write leonard as an absolute sex god but for todays prompt i wanted to subvert it a little bit and what do you know, i fell in love with this concept

day 25: **nice guys come last**

Leonard was honestly starting to doubt his own knowledge of the human body. He was a doctor, damn it. He was supposed to know all of this stuff inside and out. So however the hell Jim managed to blow his mind like this, again and _ again _ , he had no goddamn idea. 

He starting to wonder about another thing, concerning the human body: if it was possible to die from too many orgasms. 

It really felt like he came close, a second ago, after the last of three orgasms Jim had given him that night. Leonard wasn’t sure if he’d ever be able to breathe normally again, or if he’d spend the rest of his life panting like he’d just finished running a marathon. He tried to ground himself--curling his fingers in the bedsheets, rubbing his face against the soft cotton and closing his eyes--and just  _ breathed _ . It was all he could do. 

He heard Jim laughing quietly in the way he always did when he thought something was cute, felt Jim’s hands across his too-warm skin. They wrapped around his waist to splay out against his stomach and then Jim’s chest was pressing up against his back. Jim was usually so warm, like a damn sunbeam in human form, but right now he felt cool and gentle and right. 

“You’re gonna kill me,” Leonard mumbled into the mattress. Jim laughed again, breath tickling the side of Leonard’s neck. He kissed him right there, too, at his pulse point, and that was apparently his response. 

It didn’t exactly feel like disagreement. 

“I mean it.” He shifted, turned his head, tried to use the friction of the sheets to push his hair away from his forehead. Jim apparently knew exactly what he’d been aiming for and one of his hands came to smooth Leonard’s sweaty hair back from his face for him. 

Jim knew fucking  _ everything _ about Leonard,  _ apparently _ . Knew exactly how to turn him on and how he liked to be touched and how to make him come so hard he saw stars and how to get him hard again not even 30 minutes later. He was making Leonard’s body do things he didn’t even know were possible. 

Not that Leonard was complaining. There was really just one thing about it which bothered him. 

Tonight wasn’t too different from the last couple of nights. He was barely conscious from the orgasms Jim had just wrung out of him, with his hands, his mouth, his cock--although they hadn’t gotten that far tonight--and he felt like sleep was creeping up on him, threatening to pull him under for the next eight hours at least, and Jim still hadn’t come  _ once _ . 

“You didn’t come yet,” he muttered, and Jim just continued the sweet, soothing touch of his hand against Leonard’s forehead, fingertips smoothing across the planes of his face. “Stop that. Stop. I’m gonna fall asleep.”

“You get so grumpy after you come.”

“Your fault. You take it too far until I’m about  _ dead _ and now I’m extra mad cause I want to make it even but I can’t even open my eyes.”

“You don’t need to make it even.” Jim leaned over a little bit to kiss the edge of Leonard’s jaw. 

“I can feel your dick against my ass.”

“So? It’s a boner, it’s not a medical condition.”

Leonard snorted. Jim was somehow simultaneously living up to and subverting all of those rumors people spread about what he was like during sex. 

“You can make me come tomorrow. Unless I beat you to it,” Jim said. He was kissing Leonard’s neck again before he got the chance to groan in response. Leonard settled for a very unenthusiastic huff, and Jim laughed and kissed him once more in the same spot.

“Can you just trust me when I say that I love having sex with your whether I come or not?”

“Hmm.”

“I like taking care of you.” Jim trailed his kisses up to Leonard’s jaw, and then his cheek, and whispered, “Now stop trying so hard to stay awake. I can see you struggling.”

Leonard wanted to deny it. All that came out was a yawn. 

“In the morning,” he mumbled, feeling Jim’s laughter against his cheek again, “In the morning I’m gonna make you come.”

“It’s a date,” Jim said. 

That was the last thing Leonard remembered before he promptly passed the fuck out. 


	26. mckirk / begging / G

day 26: **begging**

“ _ Please, _ ” Jim begged. 

“No.”

“Bones-- _ Please _ \--”

“Absolutely not.”

“Bones!”

“You’re not taking that thing home.”

Jim crossed his arms over his chest, basically pouting at this point. He would have stomped his foot against the ground, too, if they weren’t in public. And if there wasn’t a sehlat cub at his feet. The same sehlat cub which he was insisting they take back onto the ship with them. 

He’d already named it. 

“I don’t even have to ask, you know. I’m the Captain of the Enterprise. I could register Astro as an emotional support animal with one email.”

Leonard blinked at him. 

“The registration form for an emotional support animal needs to be approved by the CMO,” he deadpanned, and he could see Jim dying a little inside before he’d even finished his sentence. 

“And there’s no way in  _ hell _ I’m letting you take that Vulcan bear onboard the ship.”

“Spock said they’re perfectly safe if you train them!”

“Is that supposed to convince me? That Spock is on your side?”

“Come  _ on _ ,” Jim groaned. He bent over and picked up Astro, who was about the size of an Earth housecat at this point--very much a baby. Leonard knew Jim was trying to force him to acknowledge how cute he was but all he could think about was: A) how huge this thing was going to get, and B) the fact that somewhere, probably nearby, was the mother of said sehlat cub, who was _ already  _ huge and for sure had noticed one of her cubs missing. 

“ _ Look _ at him, Bones.”

“I  _ am _ . Do you know how big those things get?”

Jim pouted even more, holding Astro up next to his face. His little paws were hanging down over Jim’s hands and his fangs hadn’t fully grown in yet and he still had fluffy, soft, baby-fur. He  _ was _ cute, damn it. Leonard couldn’t deny it. He could, however, deny Jim’s request to  _ take him home _ . 

“We’re not taking him.”

Jim slumped a little bit. 

“Please?” he tried one more time. In some sort of last-ditch attempt to prove his point he all but shoved Astro into Leonard’s arms. Leonard’s instincts made him hug the baby animal close to his chest protectively. 

“Tell me you’re not in love with him already.”

“I’m not.”

Jim watched him for a moment, gaze traveling back and forth from the lump of fur in his arms to the irritated look on his face. He actually gave up a lot sooner than Leonard expected. 

“Okay. Fine. Be like that.”

“Thank you, I will,” Leonard said quietly. Just to rile Jim up a little bit he leaned down and kissed Astro’s soft little head. He’d never admit it, but his heart definitely squished when he heard Astro’s rumbly purring. And then he looked up and Jim was standing there biting his lip like it was all he could do to hold back another series of desperate _ please _ ’s. 

“What?” he asked. 

Jim raised his hands, bargaining. 

“At  _ least _ tell me I can take a picture of this.”

Leonard thought about it for a moment, stroking Astro’s fur with his fingertips. Astro nuzzled his little Vulcan-bear face into Leonard’s bicep and Jim looked like he was about to lose his mind. 

So taking a baby sehlat off of Vulcan and onto the Enterprise was definitely something Leonard had to veto, but a picture seemed innocent enough. 

(Although Leonard would come to regret it as soon as his nursing staff got a hold of it and set it as the startup screen for all of the Medbay computers)

“Go ahead,” he said, and he even smiled for the photo. That itself was enough to distract Jim for as long as it took to get the both of them beamed up, sehlat-free. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alright. full disclosure. i wrote this while watching glee and drinking red wine so it was physically impossible to take today's prompt seriously but i hope yall could bear with me for this one (HA get it)


	27. mckirk / hate sex / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HUGE DISCLAIMER PLEASE READ:
> 
> the prompt today is hate sex. i didn't hold back. neither did the two of them. if you're expecting my typical tender loving floof that i usually prefer to write you will be disappointed and possibly horrified
> 
> if you're ready for something a little bit different and potentially spicy, read on

day 27: **hate sex**

On days like this, Leonard really misses his childhood home: that big old house on the outskirts of Atlanta with peeling paint and creaky floors and, more importantly, old fashioned doors. The ones you have to pull closed all by yourself instead of some motion sensor program swishing them shut behind you before you’ve even cleared the doorway. 

Leonard wants more than anything to slam the door shut behind him right now. Especially when he sees Jim asleep in his bunk. In the middle of the fucking day. After he’d woken Leonard up halfway through the night, stumbling home from a hookup and _ insisting  _ on recounting his night out loud to Leonard who was  _ clearly _ asleep at the time. 

He’d had to wake up an hour and a half later for a 5 am clinic shift. 

He’d spent his only 10 minute break during said 12-hour shift looking up the protocol for getting a dorm reassignment. 

Jim turns over in bed and mutters in his sleep, when Leonard walks in, and that’s just not enough. If Leonard could slam the door right now and startle Jim awake it would make him feel _ so _ much better. He settles for tearing off his scrubs instead, throwing each piece of clothing onto the floor like they’d personally offended him. Then he gets an idea. 

The first boot he throws at Jim’s bedframe misses; blame it on Leonard’s shitty hand-eye coordination after 12 hours in the clinic with no sleep. 

The second one hits the headboard, centimeters away from Jim’s head. 

Nothing brings Leonard more joy than the fear in Jim’s eyes as he immediately jolts awake and sits up in bed. 

“What the fuck,” he says first, quietly, and then looks around the bed and realizes what happened. “What the fuck?” he says again, this time to Leonard, “Did you just throw your boot at me? What the fuck is your problem?”

“ _ You, _ ” Leonard snaps, and he’s so angry he forgets that he’s supposed to put pjs on now that he’s stripped down to his boxers. “You’re my fucking problem. You know what it feels like to work a 12 hour shift on no sleep? Living with you is worse than living with a newborn.”

“Well you don’t have a choice anymore do you.”

Leonard can feel the heat under his skin, rising up the sides of his face. He shouldn’t have told Jim about that on the shuttle. He hadn’t known they’d end up bunking together. He shouldn’t have told Jim anything about himself. 

“Fuck you.”

Jim rolls his eyes. All of a sudden he wonders if it really is so different living with him than living with a child. 

“Why are you like this with me?” Leonard demands. 

“What does that even mean?”

“I’ve seen how you act around everyone else in this fucking city. Like you’re working for tips. You can’t stop yourself from treating everyone you meet like you need to mate with them to save humanity and then turn it off as soon as you come home.”

“Uh. Yeah. Because I’m home.” Jim blinks at him for a moment, like he thinks Leonard is completely stupid, and then there’s something else in his face. Realization. “Oh,  _ Bones _ . Are you jealous?”

“Don’t fucking call me that.”

“You’re jealous aren’t you. You hate seeing me sleep around. You hate it when I stay out late. You’re jealous.”

“And you’re delusional.”

Jim rolls over in bed, onto his elbows, and Leonard doesn’t miss the way his sheets pool around his waist, showing off the lean, toned lines of his chest and back as he moves. 

Jesus christ. Is Jim  _ right _ ?

He sure as hell thinks he is, the way he smiles at Leonard from his bed as if the two of them aren’t absolutely mid-fight. Except it’s the kind of fight they have at least twice a week, at this point, so it’s not like Jim has any reason to be afraid of the consequences. Leonard realizes with just a little bit of  _ extra _ anger that this is why Jim is treating it like some sort of game, now, experimenting with new ways to rile him up. 

“Do you wanna fuck me?” Jim asks, smiling around the words, and all Leonard really wants is to throw another boot at his head. 

“Don’t flatter yourself. I don’t even wanna  _ look _ at you.”

“That’s such a lie.” Jim pushes himself up and out of bed, fluidly, somehow, as if he hasn’t just woken up from a midday nap. He pads over to where Leonard is still standing between his bed and his closet and still wearing just his boxers. They’re basically two steps away from being naked together, judging by the outline of Jim’s cock through his sweatpants. 

Jesus  _ fucking  _ christ. Leonard is looking at his cock, now. He can’t remember the last time he’d felt such an intense combination of anger and confusion and arousal. 

“You look at me all the time. You just did. You want me, don’t you. Is that why you’re such a bitch all the time?”

Leonard snorts. 

“I’m a bitch because you’re annoying.”

“Was that supposed to hurt?” Jim bats his eyelashes, navigates around Leonard’s bed and all but invades his personal space. “I already know I’m annoying. You want me anyway, don’t you? ”

“Fuck off.”

“You still haven’t said no. I’ve asked that question three times now.”

“I don’t have to say it.”

“Except you would,” Jim says, hand reaching between them, letting his fingertips just barely touch Leonard’s chest. “If you meant it. You would have said no.”

“ _ Why can’t you leave me the hell alone _ ,” Leonard grits out, except his body is doing the exact opposite of his words. He grabs Jim by the shoulders and pushes him forward, landing both of them onto his bed and earning a startled little yelp from Jim. The yelp is followed by a breathless sort of moan as Leonard settles on top of him. 

“You want me,” he whispers. 

“Does it turn you on to say that?”

“Honestly? Yeah.”

Leonard reaches back behind Jim’s neck, to the hair on the back of his head, and pulls. Jim moans again as his head tilts back, arms wrapping tight around Leonard’s shoulders. 

“I am so tired of hearing your voice,” Leonard says. Jim stares back at him with half-lidded eyes and he hates the way it only turns him on more. “I oughta gag your mouth.”

“Do it,” Jim breathes. 

The gag turns out to be a major improvement. Leonard doesn’t have to listen to Jim’s narcissistic excuse for dirty talk and weirdly pointed insults, but can still hear the desperate little grunts and whines coming out of his throat as he fucks him into the mattress--with energy he definitely did not have when his shift had ended an hour ago. 

Leonard thinks about tying his hands too, except it’s not really possible with the kind of bed frames Starfleet put in these dorms. But he can already tell how much Jim would get off on it. Being gagged with a necktie is already enough to turn him into a needy, writhing mess underneath Leonard. 

It’s really, really inconvenient how hot this is. Because Jim is Leonard’s roommate. His terrible, annoying, inconsiderate, intolerable roommate, and chances are they’re going to be stuck together at least until the end of the term. This is a really bad idea. A bad idea which cannot, under any circumstances, become a habit. 

Except that Leonard is already imagining it. 

“I’m gonna figure out how to tie your hands to the bed, next,” he’s essentially babbling, and he doesn’t remember giving his brain permission to say this out loud. “So you can’t even hold onto the sheets when I fuck you like this. You just have to lie there and take it.”

Jim nearly sobs in response, moans around the gag and turns his face into the mattress so he can nod his head up and down eagerly. Not that Leonard has thought about it before, but the sight of Jim pressing his face and chest into the mattress and sticking his ass up in the air and basically begging for Leonard to dominate him is completely--and also wonderfully--unexpected. 

This  _ is _ going to become a habit, isn’t it. 

“You’d like that right? All that effort you put into provoking me and all you want is to be tied down? Is that how this works?”

Jim moans again. He’s shaking with need at this point, after Leonard’s been pointedly ignoring his cock between his legs. He can barely keep up his rhythm of rocking back to meet Leonard’s thrusts. 

“You wanted me too, didn’t you.”

It’s literally impossible for Jim to dodge the question by saying something irritating and provocative. And he doesn’t even try. Instead he just desperately nods his head yes again. 

“So you shoved all your hookups in my face? That was your plan to get me into bed? You think it turned me on to see you fuck everyone on campus?”

Leonard actually doesn’t give a shit about what Jim’s plan had been. It hardly matters, anyway. The fun part for him, other than having Jim underneath him and tight around his cock and moaning like it’s the best sex of his life--is the fact that no matter what question he asks, Jim can’t answer. Jim can’t say anything at all, actually. 

It’s the most attractive he’s ever been to Leonard. 


	28. mckirk / discomfort during sex / E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: jim has a panic attack in this one. and then it's all hurt/comfort. but please be warned

day 28: **discomfort during sex**

Jim hadn’t realized that his heavy-breathing-because-he-was-getting-fucked had turned into actual, anxiety-induced  _ hyperventilating _ until too late. Until way, way too late. Suddenly everything hurt. Bones’ hands against his skin felt like sandpaper and his cock was too big and too much and Jim couldn’t breathe and  _ not _ in the good way and Bones’ voice in his ear didn’t sound like him anymore. 

He would have said something, told Bones to stop, maybe even screamed, except that he couldn’t breathe anymore. He felt like his entire body was tensing up, which only made the pain worse. Finally his instincts kicked in and he catapulted himself out from under Bones, off of the bed and across the room and nearly slammed into the wall, and his whole body shook and he felt like his brain was going to short circuit with how fast his heart was beating. 

He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t  _ breathe _ . He barely managed to find the cool surface of the wall with his back and slide down to sit on the floor, tucking his head between his bent knees like Bones always told him to do when this happened. 

Bones. Jim couldn’t even think about Bones right now, about what he must have just witnessed. He never wanted to raise his head up again and have to look at him, to see him heartbroken and abandoned and confused on the bed. It wasn’t his fault. 

It was Jim’s. Jim’s fault for not saying anything, still, after the months they’d been together. For not telling Bones that there were things during sex that sometimes triggered him. For being damaged in the first place, for getting involved with people who wouldn’t hear the word  _ no _ . Bones didn’t deserve to have to deal with this. It was Jim’s fault. It was all his fault. 

Apparently he’d been saying that out loud, maybe more than once. Because when his ears stopped ringing and he could finally hear Bones’ voice, all he said was, 

“It’s not your fault. Jim. Whatever it is, it’s not your fault.”

“It is,” Jim said, quiet so his voice didn’t shake too much. He choked on his next breath. 

“Hey, hey, breathe, okay. We don’t have to talk about it right now. Just breathe. Can I touch you?”

“I don’t know.”

Jim wanted Bones to touch him, wanted to feel the warmth of his hands, those hands that always seem to make everything right again, like they never stop healing even when he’s not in the clinic. He wanted Bones. But he didn’t know. He couldn’t be sure if Bones’ touch was going to feel like  _ Bones _ , or someone else. “I don’t know,” he said again. “I don’t know. I can’t--”

“I want to put my hand on the back of your neck, just so you know I’m here. Can I do that?”

Jim thought about it. He tried to, at least, with what little brain function he had left. 

“Okay--yeah.”

Bones’ hand settled on the back of Jim’s neck, steady and solid, not pushing him down or demanding that he sit up yet. Jim took a real, even breath for the first time in what felt like forever.

“That’s better. Keep breathing. It’s gonna go away.”

Jim tried to focus on one breath at a time, tried to make each one longer than the last. Something Bones had also told him to do. He was surprised it had taken Bones so long to actually witness this happening to Jim in real time. All of this advice had been given after Jim was steady enough to text Bones what had just happened. Having Bones here changed everything. 

Things started coming back. The feeling of the wall against his lower back and the floor underneath his feet. He was cold. Freezing cold, actually. Bones’ hand was so warm against his neck and he could sense Bones there, too, could see his feet where he knelt in front of Jim and feel the way the air was different where Bones was next to him, protecting him, almost. 

A few minutes ago Jim was so overstimulated he thought he might pass out, but now it wasn’t enough. He needed more. He needed to know where he was, needed to know Bones was there, too. 

“Say something,” he choked out. “Talk to me please, just--something. Anything.”

It was quiet for a moment, and then,

“Do you want breakfast for dinner?”

Jim snorted. 

“I thought you had a moral issue with breakfast for dinner.”

“I’m willing to be convinced. You had me thinking about pancakes earlier and now I kind of want some.” Bones was speaking quieter than usual. Slower. More gentle. Jim knew that  _ what _ he was saying didn’t really matter to either of them. 

He would wonder, later, after he finally lifted his head and Bones smiled at him and pulled him into a hug. After he helped Jim up from the ice-cold floor and back into bed and held Jim against his chest under the blankets, and Jim didn’t have to look down at Bones’ hands or over his shoulder at his face because he knew it was Bones, unmistakably. That it couldn’t have been anyone else, because nobody else held Jim like this, and nobody talked to him like Bones did and nobody would have sat with him through a panic attack and known exactly what to do. He wondered how he’d ever survived one before now, before he had Bones with him through it all. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, once he found a steady voice again. Even though he felt like he could pass out any second because he was so tired and Bones was so warm and the bed was so soft. He didn’t want it to be left unsaid. 

“Don’t.”

“I am, though. That was kind of intense, I’m just...sorry you had to see me like that. I mean, especially within that context.”

“Well it’s not like I’m expecting advanced notice on when you’re going to have a panic attack.”

Jim sighed, laughing a little bit as he breathed out. 

“I know,” he said, “I’m--”

“Apologize again and I’m kicking you out of this bed,” Bones deadpanned, even as his arm tightened around Jim’s waist. “The only thing you’re allowed to be sorry for is not telling me that I could have triggered you during sex and leaving me to spontaneously feel like shit when it happened.”

Jim would have apologized again, because he really did feel sorry for that part, more than anything. Except he knew Bones would only bitch at him for it. He shifted, pushing back against Bones’ chest only to feel the way Bones’ arms wrapped around him. He took a deep breath. 

“It’s just...we made it this long without anything happening and I just hoped that meant it wouldn’t.”

Bones pressed his lips against Jim’s shoulder blade, soothing. Jim wanted to stay in that moment forever.

“But it did,” he said softly. “And it’s okay. We’ll talk about it whenever you’re ready.”

Jim felt like his heart was vibrating, but this time it was good. Everything felt good again, even the little spark of worry that Jim was falling in love with Bones too fast. He wanted to just say it already, wanted Bones to know that he was the only person in the world for him, but he decided it might be too much after everything else tonight. He could wait. 

Bones couldn’t, apparently. 

“You know I love you, right?” he said, breath ghosting over Jim’s skin. 

There really wasn’t anything to say to that, except, 

“I love you too.”


	29. mckirk / love at first sight / T

day 29: **love at first sight**

It had been love at first sight. Leonard just didn’t know it at the time, and wouldn’t know it until, what, four years later?

Second sight was a better description. Even though it was probably like the millionth time Leonard had  _ seen _ Jim, technically, and maybe the hundred thousandth time they’d sat next to each other. But it was only the second time Leonard had seen Jim, already in his seat, on the shuttle that was going to take them up into space for their first five year mission, and sat down next to him and shared a look that meant more in one second than a full conversation would with anyone else. 

That was when Leonard realized that the exact same thing had happened the first time he saw Jim, when he begrudgingly took the seat next to him on that god-foresaken shuttle from Riverside to San Francisco. He’d sat down next to a perfect stranger and they’d looked into each other’s eyes and it was like they already knew everything about one another, like they could already see that the rest of their lives were going to intertwine. 

Love, that’s what it had been. Love at first sight and Leonard was just too drunk and damaged to even notice at the time. 

Now it knocked the wind out of him, when he sat down next to Jim, this person who had been so important to him ever since they got sat together on that shuttle ride, and Jim smiled and in his eyes Leonard could see their entire history together, and their entire future, and every good thing about today. 

Leonard must have been staring too long. Jim’s smile turned into something more amused, like he wasn’t sure what Leonard was being weird about this time but he still wanted to be with him anyway. 

“What?” he asked, voice tinted with a little bit of laughter. 

Jim was in a good mood, of course. He had been for a while, ever since he found out not only that he’d been assigned under Pike on the Enterprise, but that Leonard had been assigned to their Medbay as well. He’d been the kind of happy that didn’t even require celebratory alcohol for the past few weeks. Leonard spent most of that time rolling his eyes and calling Jim a nerd, but secretly it made him feel better about going up into space, knowing Jim would be on the same ship, always just a couple decks away. 

Leonard’s tongue was too big for his mouth, it felt like. He didn’t know if he was going to be able to form a sentence to explain himself, or even  _ how _ he’d explain himself if he could. 

But he was looking into Jim’s eyes, still, at his expression full of joy and excitement and friendship and laughter. His eyes that were so blue Leonard was sure he’d never feel homesick for the skies on Earth. His smile and the way it was so incredibly Jim, like his entire personality was contained in that single gesture, especially when it was aimed in Leonard’s direction. 

It just kind of….slipped out. 

“I’m in love with you,” Leonard said. He hadn’t even buckled his damn seatbelt yet. 

And Jim’s entire face turned brighter than the sun. There was no way this was news, considering the two of them had been friends for four years and effectively joined at the hip for the last two, at least. But Jim was smiling like he’d never heard anything so wonderful before than Leonard saying  _ I’m in love with you _ . 

“Really?” he asked, quiet and breathless and completely in awe and Leonard couldn’t stop himself from smiling a little, too. 

“Yeah. Really.”

Jim started laughing, but it wasn’t mocking, it was more like...like his joy had to spill over somehow, and it came out as laughter. 

The two of them were no strangers to causing a scene. It was how their friendship had started, anyway, with the both of them antagonizing everyone on the shuttle around them by arguing and then drinking and then having an increasingly morbid conversation through the rest of the flight. And here they were, taking their second shuttle ride, this time from San Francisco into space, onto the next big thing and still making everyone around them uncomfortable because Jim was laughing his ass off and Leonard was beet red and neither of them had noticed that one of the security officers had been instructing Leonard to buckle his seatbelt for the last two minutes. 

Finally Jim heard her and leaned over and buckled Leonard’s seatbelt over his chest for him. It was a simple gesture. It wouldn’t have meant anything to Leonard if he hadn’t just confessed his love for Jim a second ago, but now it meant everything. The way Jim was watching out for him, for one, but also the way he leaned in and the smell of his shampoo and the light reflecting off his eyes and the small little smile that still tugged at the corners of his mouth even as he spoke plainly to the security officer. 

Then he was looking back at Leonard, and the shuttle was starting to move and Leonard couldn’t even find it in him to feel motion sick. He had too many other things to think about, like the way Jim’s knuckles brushed his own in the space between their seats. Leonard went ahead and wove their fingers together, because what the hell. He really didn’t give a shit if anyone was watching. 

Jim caught his eyes for a moment and then snorted. 

“ _ What _ .”

“I just can’t believe--” the goofy grin was back. Leonard would say  _ I love you _ as many times as it took to keep that stupid smile on Jim’s face. “--I knew you were going to get weird on this shuttle. But I thought it would be more like morbid, life-or-death stuff you learned in your science lectures--”

“I can get morbid if you want.”

“No,” Jim said, and he had to lean close now that the shuttle was taking off and the engine was roaring in their ears. “I loved it. I love you too.”

Leonard felt his heart rate speed up. He was pretty sure it was all Jim, actually, and had nothing to do with his aviophobia. Jim might have effectively beaten that fear out of Leonard with all those flight sims he dragged him to, anyway.

“But I figured you already knew that,” Jim added. 

Leonard breathed out a laugh. “I think I did.”

Jim looked at him, leaning in close, his gaze easy and familiar. Then his eyes flicked down to Leonard’s mouth and back up again. 

“Would it be completely inappropriate if I kissed you right now?”

“Considering we literally got drunk together the last time we were on one of these?” Leonard asked, just to see the wrinkles around Jim’s eyes when he laughed. “I think if they didn’t kick us out after  _ that _ , we’re in the clear.”

Jim turned to face Leonard as much as he could with his seatbelt on, as much as it took for him to be able to grab Leonard’s face in both hands and bring their mouths together and kiss him. The kiss started out innocent enough, but it couldn’t even have been a minute before Jim was kissing him long and deep and a little bit dirty and  _ absolutely _ inappropriate considering where they were and how many people could see. 

Honestly, the rest of the officers on the ship deserved to know what they were going to have to deal with for the next five years. 


	30. mckirk / experimentation / E

day 30: **experimentation**

“That’s not really a proper experiment,” Leonard says. 

“Course it is,” Jim leans forward on his elbows, and it comes as no surprise that he seems to view this conversation as dinner-appropriate. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

Leonard pushes around the food on his plate before finally giving up and reaching for his beer instead. “ _ Because, _ ” he explains, “if your hypothesis is that Khan’s blood in your veins will have an effect on your sex drive, and you didn’t take down any observations whatsoever before the transfusion occured, then you don’t even have the  _ option  _ to compare results and prove causation.”

“Oh, I love it when you speak science to me.”

Leonard raises one eyebrow at him over the glass as he finishes the last of his beer. Jim just mirrors him, like it’s a challenge, and then, in a moment which took way too long to arrive, he realizes what this conversation is actually about. 

-

The trip back to Jim’s quarters from the mess is entirely routine, up to the point when Jim slowly crowds him against the wall as soon as they’re inside, bringing his mouth closer at a slow enough pace that Leonard can still back out. When Leonard leans forward instead, meeting him halfway, things start to shift. 

Realistically though, things had started shifting between them long before this. 

“I hope you’re not still set on this being a scientific experiment, because analyzing the results of your  _ first  _ time having sex with someone is definitely going to skew the data,” Leonard says later, when his mind finally starts to catch up with what’s going on. It had sort of taken a break from the moment of their first kiss until the part where Leonard and Jim ended up half-dressed in bed. 

Jim raises his head from where he’s been exploring Leonard’s chest and collarbone and neck with his mouth, moving slowly down his body. He looks almost predatory--like a jaguar maybe. Leonard wonders if he’s doing that on purpose. But then he smiles at Leonard and it’s real and familiar and Leonard has seen this smile a thousand times already before they even made it to this bed. 

“That’s it,” he says, “I’m officially ordering you to stop talking dirty.”

“It’s not dirty talk, it’s…” Leonard is babbling, really, anything to distract from the fact that he has no idea what he’s supposed to be doing. The concept of having sex with Jim turned out to be a lot more appealing than he would have expected, and now here they are, but it’s not that simple. In fact, it’s fucking confusing. “I’m just saying--”

“As your Captain. I’m ordering you.”

“Okay,” Leonard says. What else is he supposed to say? Jim leans forward to continue pressing kisses to Leonard’s skin and he can see the muscles in his back and shoulders flexing as he moves. And then one of Jim’s hands finds the outline of his cock over his boxers and Leonard decides that, as confusing as this is, there’s no way in hell he’s going to put a stop to it. 

“Okay, yeah.”

“Yeah?” Jim repeats. 

Leonard sighs but his body betrays him a little bit. It’s more of a moan. 

“Stop making fun of me.”

“I’m not making fun of you, Bones.” Jim punctuates this with a kiss to the underside of his jaw as his hand steadily palms at Leonard’s cock, somehow knowing exactly what he needs. “I just think it’s cute how awkward you are right now.”

“God, shut up,” Leonard breathes. He’s hoping it’ll distract Jim from talking altogether if he takes that hand and slips it under the waistband of his boxers  _ for _ him. It actually kind of works. 

Later, after Leonard’s already come once with Jim’s mouth around his cock and two fingers in his ass (only to watch the self satisfied grin on Jim’s face as he pressed a third finger inside of him before he’d even come down all the way), and then a second time while Jim fucked him with his face buried in Leonard’s neck, Jim brings it up again. Kind of. 

“How was it?” he asks. 

“How was what. Your dick?”

Jim snorts and rests his head against Leonard’s chest, right over his heartbeat. 

Most of the confusion Leonard felt in the beginning is gone now, with Jim sprawled out on top of him, showing the same disregard for Leonard’s personal space as he always does. 

In fact, Jim in bed turned out to be the same Jim Leonard had already known. 

He saw his best friend every time Jim smiled and made a joke and fixed every awkward moment with his laughter, and he saw his Captain every time Jim asked him if he was okay, if this was what he wanted, if he needed to slow down. And there were new moments, like the way Jim settled over his body so easily, the way he seemed to know how the two of them ought to fit together, the hunger in his eyes when he looked down at Leonard while he was slowly pushing himself inside. These things were new, but they were still  _ Jim _ . They all made sense, in the end, with the version of Jim that already lived in Leonard’s head. 

“Well,” Leonard starts, resting one hand over the side of Jim’s neck, keeping him there against his chest. He traces the line of Jim’s jaw with his thumb. He wants to be able to feel the moment when Jim starts cringing at this topic being brought up again. This topic which had so clearly been a sad excuse for a pick up line. “I told you already, it’s impossible to draw a conclusion about your performance after the blood transfusion if we never had sex before it. Although--”

“Oh my god  _ okay, _ ” Jim groans, although he’s not making any attempt to squirm out of Leonard’s grip. “If I admit that the Khan’s blood thing had been an excuse will you  _ please _ let that go.”

“I fuckin knew it.”

Jim turns his head a little bit, shifting just enough to look up at Leonard. His eyes are sparkling with something a little bit playful, something that only makes Leonard want to hold Jim tighter against his chest. Instead he says, 

“We could still run a few more trials, though.”

“You are such a dork.” Jim smiles, and shifts a little bit more so that he can prop himself up over Leonard again. 

“You knew what you were getting.”

“I did,” Jim says. He pulls Leonard forward into another kiss. 

The shape of Jim’s mouth is already familiar, and the way Jim’s body lines up against his, and Leonard resigns himself to the fact that they won’t be leaving this bed for a long time. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god you guys tomorrow is literally the last day. THE LAST DAY. 
> 
> i wanted to ask for yall's input so i can make sure the finale is extra special. i'm planning on doing the prompt "healing/comfort sex" and want to know if you would rather i write it in the regular st universe, or as a conclusion to the high school au from chapters 10 and 16. CAST YOUR VOTE IN THE COMMENTS. ALSO, I LOVE YOU


	31. mckirk / healing or comfort sex / M

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god. you guys. we did it. we made it. i'm actually about to go into shock, i think. or maybe i'm already there. 
> 
> i just want to say thank you so so much to everyone who came and left comments every day. if it wasn't for yall i doubt i would have made it a week into this. and now i've done an entire month of posting every day and it's just so crazy to think about. so thank you and i love all of you to the ends of the universe.   
please come say hi on tumblr (espressohnos-blog) because i unfortunately wont be keeping up with the daily posting but i will definitely be around to help yall through your post-trektober withdrawals. 
> 
> also, final thing: thanks to everyone who voted yesterday for the au of today's chapter. it turned out to be a 50/50 vote, so i had my friend break the tie as a neutral party and for the last chapter we have another continuation of the high school au from chapters 10 and 16. please enjoy i hope it's a good enough note to end on
> 
> okay i'll stop talking now!!

day 31: **healing or comfort sex**

In hindsight, they should have expected that attempting to have a normal date on prom night, instead of doing something special--or nothing at all--would backfire. Especially when said normal date involved running into groups of other teenagers dressed up for prom every  _ five _ seconds. 

And they almost made it through the whole thing before Leonard asked Jim if he was  _ really _ okay. 

“I already told you I don’t even want to go,” Jim said. He was trying not to seem upset about it except he shut the car door behind him a little harder than he meant to, and Leonard looked over at him from the driver’s seat like he  _ definitely _ knew Jim was upset. Jim slouched into the seat. “Just drive me home.”

Jim loved Leonard. Because he was kind and smart and thoughtful and funny--and the kind of dork who still left notes for Jim even when they’d started texting and calling and making out in Leonard’s basement. And for some reason Leonard was still here with him after an entire semester, and for some reason he cared enough about Jim, too, to get to know him, and his moods, and figure out exactly what Jim needed when he was in a bad one. 

Right now Jim just needed him to drive, because if they talked any more about this he was going to have to admit that he actually was upset about the prom thing. And then he’d have to admit that he couldn’t even explain  _ why _ he was upset about the prom thing. 

But Leonard knew all of this, so he just nodded and drove Jim home. When he finally got to Jim’s driveway, to his little house on the wrong side of town, he shut the car off and they both just sat there for a minute. 

Jim didn’t know what to say. He knew he probably should just say goodnight and go upstairs and sleep off his bad mood, but he couldn’t bring himself to open the car door. 

Leonard was the one who finally broke the silence.

“Can I come in?” he asked. 

Jim thought about it for a second. Leonard hadn’t really been in his house for longer than a few minutes at a time. They usually went to Leonard’s, or drove to the county line, or fooled around in the back row at the movies. Jim didn’t know how he felt about letting Leonard come inside, about having sex in his house. He didn’t even know how he felt about having sex tonight to begin with. 

“Why do you want to,” Jim asked, and he knew it was the wrong thing to say because Leonard looked sad, all of a sudden, staring back at him from the driver’s seat in the almost-dark. Jim hadn’t meant to let his insecurity slip out, too. Leonard didn’t deserve to hear that, after he’d literally spent the entire evening with him. 

“Because I want to spend time with you,” Leonard said simply. “And because you’re upset and I don’t want you to be alone.” 

His voice was careful but Jim knew from experience that he wasn’t taking no for an answer. He didn’t even try to argue with the part where Leonard pointed out that he was upset even after he’d spent the whole night denying it. 

“Okay,” he said. “You can come up.”

Nobody was home, at least. Jim made note of that when he led them through the empty garage. But they’d been gone for a couple days, now, his mother and Frank. Jim hadn’t bothered to ask if it was for business or what else, he’d just been happy to have the place to himself. 

If Leonard was the one with the house to himself, he realized, he would have invited Jim over as soon as his mom’s car cleared the driveway. He tried not to think about this as he led Leonard through the kitchen and down the hall, tried not to let it make him feel even worse. 

Finally the door closed behind them and they were standing in Jim’s tiny mess of a bedroom, and as much as Jim was upset and as much as he hadn’t wanted Leonard to see him like this, he found himself stepping forward until he was close enough to let his forehead fall against Leonard’s shoulder. 

“Jim, what’s wrong?” Leonard asked, one hand coming to rest against the small of his back. 

“I don’t know.”

“I thought you didn’t want to go to prom.”

“I  _ didn’t. _ ” Jim crossed his arms over his chest and pressed closer, until Leonard took the cue to wrap his arms around him. “I wouldn’t have had a good time anyway.”

“You know, there’s a difference between knowing you won’t have a good time and actually not wanting to go.”

“Mmhph,” Jim mumbled against the fabric of his shirt. Summer started early in this town, Jim learned a few weeks ago, and Leonard smelled like deodorant and laundry soap and just a little bit of sweat. It reminded him of all the afternoons when he didn’t want to go home so he waited in the library after school instead, until Leonard got out of weight training, and Leonard would drive him home and park around the corner from Jim’s house and kiss him like he had nowhere else he had to be. 

It had been easy, back then, for Jim to let himself feel loved, and wanted. It had all been new. Now Jim just felt like he had somehow tricked Leonard into staying with him, or something, like it was just a matter of time before Leonard realized he didn’t want him. Even though all the evidence pointed to the fact that he  _ did _ . 

“We could have gone, you know,” Leonard said softly. “I would have taken you. And made you dance with me even though you’d stand there complaining about the music the whole time.”

Jim breathed out a laugh. 

“You’re right.”

“I know I’m right. And I would have had fun with you.”

“I doubt it.”

“Will you stop?” Leonard pulled away from Jim, holding him by his shoulders. He had that same sad look in his eyes as he did earlier in the car. “Do you know how shitty it makes me feel to hear you talk like this?”

Jim let out a long exhale and covered his face with his hands, fingers slipping underneath the rims of his glasses. “I’m sorry,” he breathed, and waited for the moment where Leonard would finally give up and stop touching him and leave his room and drive away. 

That moment didn’t come. Leonard’s voice turned a little bit irritated but he didn’t let go of Jim, didn’t stop the soothing touch of his thumb over the curve of Jim’s shoulder. 

“You’ve been so fucking cryptic all the time, latey, can you just tell me what it is you’re insecure about?”

“Everything!” Jim snapped, and he didn’t mean to say it like that but he couldn’t take it back, and now Leonard was staring at him with wide eyes and his hands went loose around Jim’s shoulders and finally fell to his sides. 

All Jim wanted to do was step forward into his arms again and pretend he hadn’t said that, but he  _ did  _ say that, and Leonard didn’t understand. He deserved at least that much. 

“Everything, okay,” Jim repeated. His voice still felt too loud even though he was almost whispering, now. The air between them just felt too quiet. The whole room did. Jim wasn’t used to having Leonard in here. He wasn’t used to _ talking _ in this house. “Everything makes me insecure. You’re better than me in every way that counts, I just--I think about us, together, and I don’t understand why you can’t see that.”

Leonard watched him carefully. That was what he did. Ever since their first few disastrous conversations after Jim moved here, he took his time to think. To actually listen to what Jim was saying and try to understand. It was another one of those things about Leonard that Jim loved, and didn’t deserve. 

“Because that’s not what I see when I think about us.”

“So what, then,” Jim asked. 

“I see myself, and--and the only other person who laughs at all of my jokes. And you don’t make fun of me for doing extra credit assignments and getting a hundred on tests.”

“People make fun of you for that?”

“Don’t interrupt me,” Leonard cut in, but he was smiling a little bit. Jim raised his hands up in surrender. “And you gave me a second chance after I fucked up the first time I tried to speak to you. The first few times, actually. And you played along when I wrote you all those notes and then started writing them back and it made me so happy. Because I’m not always good at this stuff, but you didn’t care.”

Jim wanted to say something like _ you’re a hell of a lot better at it than I am  _ but he knew it would just piss Leonard off more than anything, if he kept jumping at every opportunity to insult himself. 

“Everyone expects me to be some sort of perfect guy. I don’t know, I guess…” he shook his head. “I guess I got a growth spurt two summers ago and everyone forgot that I was the school outcast with a dead dad who ate lunch in the library every day.”

“You were?”

“Yeah.”

It actually made a lot of sense, when Jim thought about it. Leonard always seemed to know what Jim was going through when he complained about being an uncool transfer student with family drama. He always seemed to know what Jim needed. Jim wondered if Leonard had anyone like that when he was struggling after his father died and it made him sad to think that he didn’t. 

“I know it doesn’t seem like it, but none of those people really care about me. Not like you do. Because you’re the only one who bothered to get to know me. I don’t think you realize how special that is.”

Jim already felt a blush creeping up his cheeks, because Leonard usually never talked like this. Not out loud, anyway. He looked down at his feet. 

“I mean, you could tell me, if you want.”

He heard Leonard huff out a sigh and then saw his feet as he stepped closer, felt his body just inches away. 

“You’re special,” Leonard said again. “I don’t care if you don’t play football or if you don’t want to go to prom or if you don’t have a big house. And I don’t even care if you spend our entire date in a bad mood because you think these things matter. You’re still special when you’re in a bad mood.”

Okay, Jim was absolutely blushing now. He was blushing and his heart was beating so fast and he couldn’t believe it was  _ that _ easy, to ask Leonard for what he needed and then get it. He looked up and Leonard was smiling at him, but Jim could see the uncertainty in his eyes, too. Like he was afraid he hadn’t said the right thing. 

Jim smiled back. He didn’t care if he looked goofy when his cheeks touched the edges of his glasses. 

“Tell me again,” he said, and the uncertainty faded from Leonard’s expression. 

“Can I show you?”

Jim nodded, and Leonard took his hands in his own and walked backwards across the room, towards Jim’s bed. He sat back easily on the mattress, pulling Jim forward onto his lap, and Jim realized that he didn’t care that Jim’s bed was small and that the sheets were tangled up in a pile from when he’d rushed out of bed this morning. For once, Jim didn’t feel like he needed to apologize, because Leonard didn’t care. 

He settled over his lap, felt himself finally start to relax. He’d spent the entire evening wondering if it was even a good idea to see each other today, or if it was all just out of obligation because of what their classmates were doing. Now there was no doubt in his mind that this was what he wanted to be doing. He couldn’t even bring himself to imagine that there was somewhere else Leonard would rather be, not now, not with the way Leonard was looking up at him, careful and reverent like that first time they’d laid down in the backseat of Leonard’s car and spent all afternoon exploring each other’s touch. 

The tension was building between them until finally Leonard leaned forward that last little bit and kissed him once, sweetly, before pulling his glasses off of his face. 

“How can you show me if I can’t see?”

“I’ll think of something,” Leonard said, “Come here.”

He pulled Jim forward by the back of his neck into another kiss, this one deeper and longer and Jim pressed their bodies even closer, rolling his hips when Leonard’s hands settled on his waist. Jim vaguely noticed that they were moving, but his body instinctively followed when Leonard laid back onto the bed, chasing Leonard’s mouth for another kiss, and another, and another. 


End file.
